Abstract Large corporate scandals in the US and Europe, from the early 21st century, such as Enron, Parmalat, WorldCom and many others, have seriously shaken public confidence in the auditors’ work. Consequently, many countries have recognized the need for introduce the forensic accounting as a more advanced and reliable form of protection against manipulative financial reporting by companies, and have completed the accounting profession with the forensic accountant title, as an active fighter against various types of frauds in companies.

Abstract This study explores revenue recognition and reporting expenses relevant to the stage of completion of the contract agreements. Literature suggests that the taxation effects financial reporting, realization of capital gains as well as revenue recognition. We argue that construction firms make use of these estimates to postpone revenue and value added tax recognition. The analysis grounds on the assumption that the value added tax effects timely recognition of revenues from construction agreements, where managers are incentivized to underestimating stage of completion and suppress recognition of gross earnings to better align emerging of the value tax related liability with contracted and expected inflows of cash. Results show that the revenue recognition is positively associated with reported income before tax and cost of material as a direct expense that can be allocated to the execution of construction agreements. These findings build baseline for future research that assesses effects of newly adopted standard IFRS 15 on real earnings management practice in construction industry of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The optimal capital structure differs between companies and depends on the nature of the business, the characteristics of the business, etc. Usually when business income is higher, there is a reduction in business risk, while, on the other hand, higher profits and accumulated profits lead to an increase in investments and debt. In the research 10 companies of the power sector, representing the stock exchange index ERS 10 were examined. The following dependent variable was used: short term debt to total liabilities (STDTL). The following independent variables were used: current ratio (CR), return on capital employed (ROCE), earning before interest taxes depreciation (EBITDA), return on assets (ROA), return on equity (ROE),  the tangibility of assets (TOA), firm size (FS) and gross domestic product growth (GDP growth). The research period covered the years from 2008-2018 on a semi-annual basis. The total number of observations was 220. The main objective of the paper is to determine explanatory factors that influence the changes in short-term indebtedness and profitability of 10 companies within the power sector of Republika Srpska entity that constitute the stock exchange index ERS 10 in the period 2008-2018 on a semiannual basis (a total of 220 observations). The dependent variable is a short term debt to total liabilities (STDTL) while independent variables are as follows: current ratio (CR), return on capital employed (ROCE), earnings before interest, taxes and depreciation (EBITDA), return on assets (ROA), return on equity (ROE), the tangibility of assets (TOA), firm size (FS) and GDP growth. 

Earnings management literature extensively explores tax regime and debt contracting as possible incentives in financial reporting. Firms engage with aggressive financial reporting to bias earnings in periods when the need for external financing increases. Contrary to this, the tax burden represents incentive for more conserva tive reporting. We argue that the level of firm’s financial reporting aggressiveness is not constant but rather floating from period to period, directly affecting the quality of financial reports. We assume that firm’s management on its own discretion determines the level of conservatism, balancing between these two incentives. The prevailing of two incentives, the need for external financing and the tax burden, determines the level of conservatism in particular reporting period. We hypothesised that the reduction in tax burden incentive overcomes the debt contracting incentive in the years of decreasing external financing need, implying more conservative accounting to balance between economic and taxable income. The total accruals are used as a measure of earnings management reflected to working capital accruals. The data analysis conducted on financial reports of 297 firms in the time-series of five years shows a significant correlation between total accruals, external financing needs and difference between economic and taxable income. This study provides an evidence on the association between conditional conservatism and external financing needs against anticipated tax sheltering activities in the economy with rather weak legal enforcement and widely spread use of accoun-ting-based covenants in debt contracting, proposing that the conditional conservatism may rather not reduce the cost of debt with the diminishing role of accounting in the debt contracting.

This study investigates relations between debt contracting and asymmetries in timely recognition of firms' earnings in emerging market economy. The asymmetric timelines of earnings, as a measure that determines predictive power of financial reports, is observed proxy explaining borrowers' earnings management. This study use longitudinal research design to explore asymmetric timeliness of earnings and its association to debt contracting. The study result suggests that the change in asymmetric timelines of earnings is significantly associated with intention of long term debt contracting application that ends with the long term debt contract closure. In more particular, the positive (or negative) change in net income in previous period is associated with the decrease in net income change in consecutive periods for firm-years when no contract is closed. Vice versa, negative net income change in prior period, reported by firm-years prior long term debt application, is associated with an increase of net income change in consecutive period. On the other hand, there is no earnings management detected in years prior to long term debt application for the firms that have reported prior positive change in net income. The research is based on specific data set extracted from financial reports in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Abstract This study investigates relationships between reported assets growth, human capital effectiveness, ability to do business with state and firms' growth. Longitudinal data were extracted from annual financial reports. Sample includes 80 companies in construction industry of Bosnia and Herzegovina from 2008-2013. Generalized estimating equations (GEE) approach is used for investigation of previously mentioned associations. We found that working with the state in Bosnian construction sector is dominant factor for outstanding increase in net reported income, while the human capital efficiency is negatively associated to its change. These findings support the theory of markets with asymmetric information, suggesting that the relational and social capital of the firm in the imperfect markets, where the state is dominant customer, drives the growth and that precedes firm’s investments into development of intellectual capital.