It is argued that managers took advantage of Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns and remote auditing and used earnings management (EM) practices extensively. Furthermore, the Covid-19 pandemic created new unsearched crisis-related incentives. This study, therefore, tests whether Covid-19 created a new incentive for managers to manipulate earnings. It also examines the association between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and board independence and EM during Covid-19. A data set of 384 firm-year observations from 2018 to 2021 of non-financial firms listed on the Amman Stock Exchange (ASE) was investigated. Results indicate that Jordanian firms engaged in EM during Covid-19 considerably more than when compared to pre-Covid-19, suggesting that Covid-19 created a new incentive for managers to manipulate earnings. Furthermore, Jordanian firms used income-increasing EM much more when compared to income-decreasing EM. However, when taking Covid-19 into account, no significant association was found between board independence and EM. In addition, the ability of CSR to constrain EM decreased. This adds to the current debate in the literature that even well-established monitoring mechanisms like board independence and CSR are unable to constrain EM practices in a unique business environment caused by Covid-19.

This study aimed to investigate the impact of the characteristics of the board of directors represented by size of board of directors, financial experience, and board of directors’ meetings on earnings management measured by Jones' modified model. The study also aimed to find out the impact of ownership concentration on the relationship between the board of directors’ characteristics combined and the earnings management in Jordanian industrial companies listed on Amman Stock Exchange. In order to achieve the objectives of the study, a quantita-tive analytical method was applied. The study was applied to a sample of 41 industrial compa-nies where their data were available during the period of study from 2013 to 2017. The findings indicated that the characteristics of the board of directors combined influenced on the earnings management in Jordanian industrial companies listed on Amman Stock Exchange. Moreover, the size of the board of directors and the financial experience had some effects on earnings management in Jordanian industrial companies listed on Amman Stock Exchange. However, the board of directors’ meetings had no meaningful effect on earnings management in Jordanian industrial companies listed on Amman Stock Exchange. It was also found that family ownership concentration had an impact on the relationship between the characteristics of the board of directors combined and earnings management in Jordanian industrial companies listed on Amman Stock Exchange. The study concluded a number of recommendations, the most important of which is to encourage the competent bodies and the boards of directors in the public shareholding companies to pay more attention to the development of more legis-lation that focus on earnings quality by reducing earnings management practices. In addition, it is necessary to identify penalties for cases of manipulation and distortion in the financial statements which reduce the use of illegal techniques and attract investors.

Taking the developing Egyptian market as its focal point, the aim of this research is to contribute to the earnings management literature. Due to the limited data available for the Egyptian market, this research examines earnings management based on the entire operating performance of companies. In particular, the question of whether ineffectively performing Egyp-tian companies engage in upward earnings management by devising and applying income-increasing policies was investigated. For the purpose of testing for income-increasing accruals, we examine whether discretionary accruals are greater for ineffectively performing firms than for effectively performing firms. The results show that ineffectively performing Egyptian companies are characterized by positive and considerably greater discretionary accruals when comparatively examined against effectively performing companies. A reasonable interpretation of these results is that ineffectively performing companies engage in earnings management practices, with the most likely mechanism being an opportunistic increase in their reported earnings. Overall, the findings of this study show that operating performance is a critical determinant of earnings management. In terms of the implications of these findings, it is necessary for officials within the Egyptian government to enhance the country’s corporate govern-ance processes, especially in view of the limitations surrounding law enforcement and investor safeguards.

This study was aimed at investigating the impact of creative accounting methods called “Earnings Manage-ment and Income Smoothing” on earnings per share in the Jordanian industrial companies. The model of Dechow et al. (1995) [Dechow, P. M., Sloan, R. G., & Sweeney, A. P. (1995). Detecting earnings management. Accounting Review, 70(2), 193-225.] was adopted to measure earnings management, and the model of Francis et al. (2004) [Francis, J., LaFond, R., Olsson, P. M., & Schipper, K. (2004). Costs of equity and earnings attributes. The accounting review, 79(4), 967-1010.] was adopted to measure income smoothing. In order to achieve the objectives of the study, the analytical quantitative approach was adopted. The study community consisted of the 57 industrial companies listed on the Amman Stock Exchange (ASE). As for the study sample, 36 companies were selected according to the target sample method in the period from 2008 to 2017. The results showed that there was a statistically significant impact of using the creative accounting methods on earnings per share in the industrial companies listed on the ASE, and there was an impact of practicing both earnings management and income smoothing on earnings per share in the industrial companies listed on the ASE. The results also showed that 27.8% of the industrial companies practiced earning management, while 47.2% of the industrial companies practiced income smoothing.

The growing convolution of industries and the need for corporate business survival has created a cognizance dilemma on the nexus of earnings management and managerial compensation paradigm, especially in developing nations. Hence, this paper sought to examine the nexus of earnings management and managerial compensation in Nigerian manufacturing firms. The study collected panel data from audited annual financial reports of six selected manufacturing firms listed in the Nigeria Stock Exchange, covering the period from, 2012-2019. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, correlation and Panel Regression Model. The findings indicate that earnings management is a significant determinant of managerial remuneration. Therefore, the study concludes that managing earnings of firms has a positive significant relationship with executive remuneration, and as such compensation should be tied to performance of the firm in real values.

The existence of good corporate governance is expected to minimize the occurrence of earnings management practices when the company is in financial distress condition. This research aims to provide empirical evidence on the influence of financial distress on earnings management practices as well as the existence of good corporate governance projected by the proportion of independent commissioners and the proportion of audit committees in weakening the influence of financial distress on earnings management practices. The population of this study is property, real estate, and building construction sector companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange for the period 2015-2019. Sampling techniques used are purposive sampling techniques and obtained samples as many as 185 samples. The earnings management tool used in this study was classification shifting. The data analysis techniques in this study used Eviews 10. The results of the analysis provide evidence that financial distress affects earnings management practices, while the proportion of independent commissioners is unable to moderate, and the audit committee strengthens the influence of financial distress on earnings management practices.

This paper investigates the impact of CSR disclosure and CEO integrity on earnings management. Analyzing a dataset of 750 firm-year observations of 150 Vietnam listed firms during the period from 2014 to 2018, the paper shows a significant positive effect of CSR disclosure on earnings management and a significantly negative impact on the CEO integrity on earnings management. The result confirms the previous studies that companies with more CSR disclosure are likely to engage in earnings management through increasing discretionary accruals. This suggests that managers may use CSR reporting to camouflage their earnings-management activities. Furthermore, the findings add to the literature of determinants of earnings management by offering an insight into CEO integrity and come to the proposal of enhancing the CEO role to control the earnings activities.

Most of studies imply that firms decrease or increase their debt capacity in context of pecking order theory or agency problems. On this point, the setting of this study is based on two main problems related to capital structure: the first is determining the source of funds for financing investments, and the second is solving the conflict between shareholders and managers, or the agency problem. The objective of this study is to provide evidence about how firms establish their capital structure in relation to pecking order theory and the agency problem by controlling earnings management in the context of Indonesian firms. This study conducts logistic regression on 28 firms in the consumer goods industry listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange from 2010 to 2017.This study finds that pecking order theory determines the capital structure of most Indonesian firms with high debt. The results imply that agency problems are unable to explain corporate capital structure and earnings management is not effective for motivating Indonesian firms to establish corporate governance.

Continuous improvement of accounting policies coincides with the increase and development of earnings management. Several studies focus on this topic, and it became subject to many investigations. This paper deals with current literature focused on several axes of earnings management like motives for practicing earnings management, earnings management types, developed models to discover earnings management, factors affecting earnings management, and the consequences of earnings management practices. Besides, this research focuses on earnings management in Saudi Arabia in particular. In the recent period, Saudi Arabia is going through changes in the Saudi economy and changes in accounting systems, such as adopting the IFRS standards, which provides opportunities for expanding research into earnings management in the Saudi Arabia context. Several studies conclude that Saudi companies' earnings management practices are done in several ways and affected by many factors.

This study aims to analyze company characteristics as a determinant of conventional and Islamic bank earnings management in several ASEAN countries (Association of South East Asian Nations). The Multiple Discriminant Analysis was applied to determine the differences between Islamic and Conventional Banks. This test was conducted based on Capital Adequacy Ratio, Income Before Tax and Interest, Non-Performing and Changing Loans, and Company's Size in the banks of Indonesia, Malaysia, and Brunei Darussalam from 2014 to 2018. The data obtained from 200 banking entities were analyzed discriminatively. The results showed that there were simultaneous differences between Capital Adequacy Ratio, Earnings Before Tax, Loan Loss Provision, Non-Performing and Changing Loans, and Company's Size as determinants of earnings management between Islamic and conventional banks. Also, it was found that Company's Size was the dominant variable determining the management differences. Based on Discriminant Analysis, there were significant differences in the determinants of conventional and Islamic earnings management. The Changing Loan variable showed the highest contribution in determining earnings management in Islamic banks. Overall, this study found that conventional banks dominated Islamic system in practicing earnings management.