Asheq Rahman

The determinants of Internet financial reporting

Abstract Responding to the widespread adoption of the Internet and the rapidly growing demands for information from stakeholders, corporations around the world are using the Internet for business and financial disclosures. Internet reporting has the benefits of low cost, wider reach, frequency and speed. Despite these benefits Internet reporting varies across companies and across countries. We study Internet financial reporting (IFR), in particular the presentation and content of IFR, of 660 large companies in 22 countries to identify the firm, and environmental determinants of IFR. The study revealed that firm size, listing on US stock exchanges and technology were firm specific determinants of IFR. Given that IFR is not just about the content of disclosure, but also about employing new presentation methods, the environment of disclosure was included in the research. The overarching disclosure environment of a country was found to be an important environmental driver for IFR presentation and less strongly for IFR content. The presentation aspect of IFR was more associated with the identified determinants than the content of IFR, which suggests that Internet presentation technologies were more related to the determinants than the content of the reports on the company Web sites.

Accounting Practice Harmony, Accounting Regulation and Firm Characteristics

Harmonization of accounting standards has been the subject of many initiatives taken at international, regional and national levels in recent years. Policy makers advancing this idea believe that accounting regulation harmony will lead to practice harmony. The literature in the area of accounting harmonization also generally relies on a similar belief. Comparing accounting regulations and accounting practices of two countries that are pursuing a program of harmonization, Australia and New Zealand, revealed some association between the levels of regulation harmony and practice harmony. Although this indicates that regulatory harmony can improve practice harmony, the association is ‘noisy’, suggesting that there are also other factors affecting practice harmony. Evidence adduced here shows that accounting practice harmony is also associated with firm‐specific characteristics.

The evolution of accruals‐based Crown (government) financial statements in New Zealand

Purpose – The aim of this research is to illustrate how a change from cash‐based accounting to accruals‐based accounting in the core public sector of New Zealand occurred.Design/methodology/approach – The grounded theory research strategy is used in a field study setting.Findings – The findings suggest that there were six antecedents of the change – key people, axial principles, communicating ideas, contextual determinants, ethos, and knowledge. All of these converged to create the synergistic process of change that led to policy innovations. In this change process, accounting change was a means to an end, where accrual accounting was introduced in order to achieve ministerial control and measure performance of government entities to provide relevant information for management decision making.Research limitations/implications – Since this is a case study based on a single country, not all analytical categories will be relevant to other contexts/countries. However, the study provides a conceptual framework...

Instructional approaches and the nature of obsolescence in continuing professional education (CPE) in accounting

Substantial emphasis is being placed on continuing professional education (CPE) by accounting professional associations throughout the world. Instructional approaches in accounting have come under the scrutiny of accounting educators and professional institutions. Although prior research has found individual learning styles and personal traits could influence the choice of instructional methods, perceived professional obsolescence is the main reason behind the increased emphasis on mandatory CPE in accounting. This paper attempts to investigate whether there is a relationship between instructional approaches and the perceived nature of professional obsolescence in CPE courses in accounting. CPE literature identifies two generic instructional approaches: (1) andragogy and (2) pedagogy. This study identifies two aspects of obsolescence in accounting: (1) obsolescence in areas of knowledge and (2) obsolescence in skills and practices pertaining to sectors of activity. The findings of this study indicate that obsolescence in the core areas of accounting knowledge and in established sectors of accounting is frequently dealt with by using andragogy and obsolescence in peripheral areas of accounting knowledge and less established sectors of accounting is frequently dealt with by using pedagogy.