Institutional Ownership and Earnings Management: A Corporate Governance Perspective

Current research is aimed to explore moderated effect of others internal corporate governance mechanisms including managerial ownership, CEO duality, and non-executive managers on the relationship between institutional ownership and earnings management. Based on recent literature, we predict to happen one poor corporate governance mechanism can be improved by a solid corporate governance. Thus, we follow the approach of Elsayed and Wahba for developing the corporate governance theories about earnings management [۲۳]. But econometric analysis, using a sample of Iranian listed firms (۲۳۲۴ firm-year), provides weak evidence for the applicability of this. The results showed that among the three corporate governance mechanisms studied (i.e., managerial ownership, CEO duality and non-executive managers level), only the percentage of non-executive managers could negatively affect the relationship between the percentage of institutional investors and earnings management; in other words, non-executive managers are used as a means to promote short-term goals of institutional shareholders. The current research results indicate that negative (positive) relationship between institutional ownership and earnings management under special conditions. Consequently, research conclusion is robust to the utilize of various econometric models and control variables.

Keywords:

Corporate governance , CEO duality , Earnings management , Institutional ownership and Non-executive managers