Jul'19

Welcome to The IUP Journal of Accounting Research and Audit Practices

Focus

With the increased emphasis on disclosures in corporate reportings, companies have been disclosing information voluntarily, in addition to the mandatory information. This voluntarily disclosed information differs by geographic region, industry and company size. It is affected by the firm�s corporate governance structure and ownership structure and is also believed to capture and summarize the firm value. Thus, corporate information becomes relevant to the investor for decision making. Considering these facts, the authors of the first paper, �The Value Relevance of Corporate Voluntary Disclosure: Evidence from India�, Rupjyoti Saha and K C Kabra, have investigated the impact of voluntary disclosure on firm value and find a direct relation between the voluntary disclosures made by the companies and the value of the company in terms of market capitalization. They suggest that adequate information is required to be disclosed by companies so that the information asymmetry between managers and investors (both domestic and foreign) reduces. According to the authors, increased flow of corporate information also improves capital market efficiency and creates interest and boosts the confidence of general investors.

The need for conserving and protecting the environment is gaining ground among corporates. Companies are focusing on environmental accounting where the efforts made by the corporate entity towards environmental protection and welfare are identified and reported. But the existing disclosure practices are neither adequate nor uniform. As there is no common method of quantifying the costs and benefits of the welfare activities undertaken by the companies, most of the companies are providing only details about their activities as part of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). Considering these facts, the authors of the second paper, �Environmental Accounting Practices in India: A Comparative Study of Perception of Academicians and Professionals�, Ramesh L and J Madegowda, have conducted a primary research to obtain the perception of academicians and professionals regarding the differences in disclosures made by the large-scale organizations, MSMEs, MNCs and domestic companies. They have also focused on the profitability of the firms in the long run. They find that large-scale organizations and MNCs provide more environmental information, and such companies are able to earn higher profits in the long run, through increased customer confidence. The authors suggest that a comprehensive accounting standard be developed and issued so that the stakeholders get reliable and comparable information about environmental costs and benefits, and this is necessary to ensure sustainable development.

In the last paper, �The Relation Between Capital Structure and Profitability of Some Selected Companies in Indian Ceramic Industry�, the author, Bhaskar Biswas, tries to find out the relationship between capital structure and profitability using the data of eight Indian ceramic companies selected on the basis of their total assets. Here, the author focuses on the proportion of debt and equity with regard to the profitability of the company.

- P Bhanu Sireesha
Consulting Editor

Article   Price (₹)
The Value Relevance of Corporate Voluntary Disclosure: Evidence from India
100
Environmental Accounting Practices in India: A Comparative Study of Perception of Academicians and Professionals
100
The Relation Between Capital Structure and Profitability of Some Selected Companies in Indian Ceramic Industry
100
Contents : (Jul'19)

The Value Relevance of Corporate Voluntary Disclosure: Evidence from India
Rupjyoti Saha and K C Kabra

The purpose of this study is to examine whether or not voluntary disclosure made by Indian listed companies are value-relevant in the capital market. The sample consists of top 100 non-financial, non-utility companies based on market capitalization listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) over the period 2014-2017. Data regarding voluntary disclosure level has been collected by analyzing the contents of annual reports. In order to investigate the impact of voluntary disclosure on firm value, fixed-effect panel data regression model is employed. Furthermore, Two Stage Least Squares (2SLS) regression model with instrumental variables is used as a robustness test to alleviate the endogeneity issue. The findings of the study reveal that voluntary disclosure is value-relevant, i.e., impacts the firm value. The more the voluntary disclosure made by the companies, the higher the value they have in terms of market capitalization. Therefore, this finding provides impetus to managers to disclose more information voluntarily to meet the information needs of the stakeholders. By evaluating the value relevance of overall voluntary disclosure, the study contributes to the relevant literature, as there is paucity of studies regarding how the market participants perceive voluntary disclosure in an emerging market such as India, which is subjected to market imperfections.


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Article Price : Rs.100

Environmental Accounting Practices in India: A Comparative Study of Perception of Academicians and Professionals
Ramesh L and J Madegowda

There is a growing concern among all sections of the society and also among different stakeholders of corporate society about the need for conserving and protecting the environment. Hence, the thinking is gaining ground about the need for each corporate citizen to account for the extent to which it has caused environmental degradation and also the efforts made by the corporate entity towards the environmental protection and welfare. In this background, environment accounting is receiving importance world over. Even in India, a few guidelines have been issued by the authorities. However, the current regulations are not adequate and therefore, there is a diversity in the environmental accounting and disclosure practices. Further, two important powerful players in this regard are the academicians and the professionals. In this backdrop, the present paper makes an attempt to analyze the opinions of both the academicians and professionals about a few aspects of environmental accounting and practices.


© 2019 IUP. All Rights Reserved.

Article Price : Rs.100

The Relation Between Capital Structure and Profitability of Some Selected Companies in Indian Ceramic Industry
Bhaskar Biswas

Ceramic is a sundry industry and contains a number of categories of products, including sanitaryware, refractory�s cement, advanced ceramics and ceramic tiles. The Indian ceramic industry is about 100 years old. The objective of the present study is to find out the relation between capital structure and profitability of eight selected ceramic companies during the period of 10 years from 2008 to 2017. Return on Equity (ROE), current ratio, debt-equity ratio and degree financial leverage have been used as the parameters of the study. As statistical measure, correlation matrix and one-way ANOVA test have been used for data analysis. The findings reveal that a few of the sample companies show positive and a few show negative correlation between ROE and the ratios of capital structure.


© 2019 IUP. All Rights Reserved.

Article Price : Rs.100