Females on board and sustainability performance in a developing country: Evidence from Egypt

This study aims at filling the existing research gap by scrutinizing the influence of females on management boards on sustainability performance in a developing country using cross-sectional data from the Egyptian Stock Exchange (EGX) of non-financial companies over the period 2012–2019. To the best of our knowledge, the analysis is considered one of the earliest empirical studies that tests the relationship of females on management board and sustainability performance in Egypt. Our results indicate that female representation on board has a positive impact on sustainability performance, which demonstrates that companies that have females on their boards have a better sustainability performance. Moreover, board size and independence enhance sustainability performance. Thus, this study has imperative repercussions on users and companies’ boards in Egypt, which recommend that current Egyptian regulatory bodies would take further steps that may significantly impact the environmental, social and corporate governance imminent in Egypt

Review of short-run performance of initial public offerings in Australia

This study investigates the short-run performance of initial public offerings in Australia. Based on sources from the Morningstar DatAnalysis database, we analyzed 211 Australian publicly traded initial public offerings (IPO) listed on the Australian stock exchange between January 2011 and December 2015 using multiple regression analysis with dummies to represent industry and listing year. According to our analysis, total market return indicates an IPO underpricing phenomenon whereas secondary market shows an overpricing scenario. Moreover, this analysis supports the contention that short-run performance fluctuations were based on the listing year and industry settings. This study contributes to the literature by analysing the short-run performance of both the primary and secondary markets

Internal control effectiveness: A study of medical institutions

As a healthcare organization, hospitals should professional service to their clients. Therefore, hospitals have obligation to improve overall service quality. In exploring the relationship between hospital budget control and organizational effectiveness, the hospital’s management staff has rich professional medical knowledge, they still have not received the training of general corporate organization and the management technology of corporate management. To improve the effectiveness of the organization, managers in hospitals should have enough experience in management control and rely on peer control. Therefore, internal control is a management process that integrates various management control and evaluation measures within the hospital, this study believes that the management staff of medical institutions should use common standards to evaluate the degree of a hospital operation, management efficiency, and medical quality. An internal control system can be simultaneously built and implemented by the topmost level of management in a hospital. It involves the commercial and business experiences related to an organization’s control, financial, and other systems. It regularly and effectively ensures compliance with management policies while safeguarding assets as well as the completeness and accuracy of safety records. Internal control is an indispensable aspect of the governance norms and methods of many companies. The hospital can also achieve value enhancement and sustainable existence through the continuous operation of the internal control system designed, and the supervision of external audit firms.

Institutional environment, competencies and firm export performance: A study of the emerging country

The study is an attempt to examine the determinants and impact of export propensity and export intensity for firm-level performance in India. The factors determining export propensity are political stability, corruption, and competition from the informal sector while the determinants of export intensity in the present study are identified as a skill of the labour force, the technological capability of a firm, and foreign ownership of technology in a firm in India. A two-stage Heckman selection model has been advanced to investigate the linkage between the export performance of Indian firms with the home institutional environment and firm competencies. Firm-level data of approximately 8,000 Indian firms are used as available from the World Bank’s Enterprise Surveys (WBES) database. The results indicate that political stability and competition effect export propensity of Indian firms while export intensity is impacted by access to technology and employing skilled labour. The study has important theoretical implications in terms of understanding the exporting behaviour of firms. It indicates that the decision of firms to export and their export performance are interlinked. It is affirmed that export intensity is dependent on firm-specific competencies while institutions indirectly influence the decision of firms to export. The policy measures of Skill India and Make in India strongly favour increased access to the skilled labour force and strengthening the domestic industry which may lead to an increase in the export intensity of Indian firms. The recent institutional measures adopted favour a stable environment of doing business as well as providing firms opportunities to focus and leverage their competencies in the best possible manner. The current nascent steps of policy reforms need to be aggressively implemented for enhanced export capabilities of Indian firms

Internationalization of family firms-challenges and opportunities in Russia

The family firms (FFs), especially the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), play an instrumental role in the economic spectrum of the Russian economy with respect to their contribution to income, output, and employment, ceteris paribus. The FFs not only contribute the domestic business activities but also make a significant contribution to international business. Ever since the launch of the mass privatization program (MPP) in Russia during 1992–1994 numerous disruptions on the business and economic landscape of Russia have emerged, and as a result, the FFs in Russia have been experiencing several new opportunities and challenges in the international market. However, it is noticeable that corporate regulatory, and corporate governance systems do not even clearly define the FFs. The current study explores the following research objectives. First, the motivation of internationalization of FFs in Russia; second, their process of internationalization, and third, the problems and challenges faced by the FFs. Different theoretical perspectives have been discussed to problematize and analyze the research objectives of the study. The current qualitative study is based on the semi-structured interview method. As many as ten FF entrepreneurs, representing five different industries, have been analyzed. The findings show that there is neither clarity nor unanimity of the very meaning and understanding of FFs in Russia. The lack of regulated bank credit and the existence of a complex taxation system dissuade the FFs from investing in new ventures and undertaking innovative activities. Similarly, the government’s directives to set up business operations at certain specified business facilities, at the exorbitant costs though, has created downward pressure on the profitability of FFs. Many FFs have initiated their international business activities owing to their growing linkages with the external contingencies, developed over time. Similarly, internationalization has increased the competitiveness of the FFs in the Russian domestic market too.

Corporate disclosures and firm characteristics: A study of the emerging market listed companies

The objective of this study is to understand whether firm characteristics explain the extent of corporate disclosures in the annual reports of listed Indian companies. In the field of accounting, voluntary information disclosures have been receiving a lot of attention as they bridge the gap between what is mandatory and what is sought by the stakeholders. Due to the prime focus of corporate disclosure literature on the linkage of company characteristics with the extent of disclosures, it becomes pertinent to study this aspect before studying the policy and regulatory impact. Hence, it is examined what prompts listed corporate entities in an emerging market like India to disclose more. The disclosure scores of Indian CNX 100 companies over a period of five years (2011–2015) related to firm characteristics such as age, size, and listing status were arrived at through content analysis and subsequent coding of the data. The study applied correlation, regression, and t-test to analyze respective scores and firm-specific data accessed from CMIE Prowess and Ace Equity industry databases. The study found firm characteristics such as age and listing status to be non-significant in leading corporations to enhanced disclosures. However, regression results improving with respect to the firm size and almost becoming significant in later years especially in the post-policy period (i.e., post-2013) remains an important takeaway from this study. The study stands on a formidable ground that it is the policy initiatives that are pushing firms to reveal more about their businesses keeping in mind the diverse perspectives of accounting information users

Corporate governance and corporate social responsibility: A study of emerging market listed firms

The main purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of corporate governance (CG) on corporate social responsibility (CSR) of Indonesian listed firms. Estimations via simultaneous equation models with ordinary least squares (OLS) and two-stage least squares (2SLS) were employed for 84 firms with a total of 924 observations over the period of 2007-2017. The results showed that a lack of CG in monitoring and supervisory mechanisms, as well as a high concentration of managerial ownership, can significantly contribute to low levels of CSR. There are data limitations as a number of firms were omitted due to the application of the CSR criteria utilised in this study. The research has implications for Indonesian listed firms with respect to aligning CSR initiatives to firm objectives. The paper provides recommendations for future research in this area. The paper provides one of the few studies to analyse CG on CSR via a comprehensive measurement of CSR. Further, it adds to the empirical academic literature from a developing country context

The use of management accounting in western Austrian family businesses: An empirical analysis

Within the scope of this study, western Austrian companies were analysed for the use of management accounting (MA). From the sample of 692 family enterprises in western Austria, relevant variables were collected to explain the use of MA and the differences between enterprises with and without MA were examined using logistic regression. The most important drivers for which the probability of using MA increases are the size of the company and the presence of a third-party manager. In addition, the results show that the older the management and the more likely it is to be female, the probability of using MA decreases. The results partially confirm the theoretical assumptions of the resource-based view (RBV) and the principal-agent theory (PAT). However, both approaches cannot provide a complete explanation for the use of MA, because the entanglement of family, ownership, and possessions means that other variables are relevant, which should be tested using other theory strands. The study is the first to deal with the problems faced by western Austrian family businesses. It could be confirmed that certain variables, which also had explanatory power in earlier studies, can also explain the use of MA in this study. In addition, it could be shown that gender and management training do not play a role in explaining the use of MA

Editorial: A diversified outlook at the theory and practices of corporate governance

The recent issue of the Corporate Ownership and Control journal (volume 19, issue 1) covers the following key themes: accounting standards, corporate governance and social responsibility, public sector governance, financial management and firm performance. The authors represent a range of developed and developing countries, making this issue of the journal truly international.

Earnings management, corporate governance, and ownership structure of Philippine initial public offerings

Prior studies examined the effect of corporate governance variables on discretionary current accrual, the most widely used measurement of earnings management. The principal-agent conflict implies that the size of the board, the percent of independent directors, CEO duality, and auditor prestige limit discretionary current accruals (DCA). This paper extends past studies by examining the effect of ownership structure on discretionary current accruals. The study determines the level of income-increasing earnings management of initial public offerings (IPOs) in the Philippines and the factors that explain it. Particularly, the paper examines the effect of ownership concentration and largest shareholder ownership on discretionary current accruals. The study uses a final sample of 105 IPO firms in Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) from 2008 to 2018. Employing the modified Jones’s (1991) model to measure discretionary current accrual and multiple regression analysis, the study finds -4.19% discretionary current accrual on the average. It also reveals that the 2002 Philippine Code of Corporate Governance (PCCG) is ineffective in curbing earnings management. In addition, there is an insignificant relationship between the size of the board, CEO duality, ownership concentration, largest shareholder ownership and auditor prestige, and earnings management. Furthermore, the paper finds a significant relationship between the percent of independent directors, industry sector, return on assets (ROA) and cash flow from operations and earnings management.