Earnings management: a comparison between ADR issuers and non-issuers in Brazil

Abstract

This paper investigates whether accounting rules and cross listing affect earnings management levels and the quality of accounting numbers produced by public firms in Brazil. The sample is composed of companies listed at the Sao Paulo Stock Exchange and obtained from the Economatica database during the 1995-2003 period. The literature suggests that cross listing affect earnings management and the quality of accounting numbers. However, our results suggest that cross listing does not affect the earnings management metrics used in the paper.