 The role of voluntary internal control reporting in earnings quality: Evidence from ChinaXudong Ji, Steven E. Kaplan, Wei Lu and Wen Qu Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics, 2020, vol. 16, issue 2 Abstract: Using discretionary accruals to proxy for earnings quality, this study investigates whether and how the first voluntary internal control reporting in 2007 is associated with earnings quality in China. We find that earnings quality is higher in 2007, yet not in 2006, for public companies issuing a first-time voluntary unqualified internal control report, compared with listed firms not issuing an internal control report. Our findings are consistent with a signalling of performance explanation and inconsistent with a signalling of effectiveness explanation. We also find that earnings quality is lower for public companies issuing an internal control report mentioning a weakness, compared with public companies not issuing an internal control report. Overall, our study suggests that public companies conduct diligent self-assessments when issuing a first-time voluntary unqualified internal control report. Consequently, there is an improvement in earnings quality. Keywords: Internal control reporting; Voluntary; Unqualified; China; First-time reporting (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jocaae:v:16:y:2020:i:2:s1815566920300060 DOI: 10.1016/j.jcae.2020.100188 Access Statistics for this article Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics is currently edited by Agnes C.S. Cheng, P. Clarkson, F.A. Gul, Zoltan Matolcsy, Dan Simunic and Ben Srinidhi More articles in Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics from Elsevier |
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