The Choice of Fiscal Year‐end in Australia

This study examines the heterogeneity of fiscal year‐end choice in Australia. It documents substantial differences in the ‘popularity’ of balance sheet dates during 1989–2010, and an increasing preference of June year‐ends in recent years. Eighty‐one percent of Australian firms choose June to align with the mandatory tax period, followed by 13% for December and 6% for other months. The paper finds that industry membership plays an important role in the choice of fiscal year‐ends, evidenced by a strong non‐June effect for manufacturing, retail and financial service companies. Finally, it summarises four popular reasons for Australian firms changing fiscal year‐ends, and finds that 26% of those firms did not disclose the change via a separate announcement on the Australian Securities Exchange in a timely manner.     

Overvalued equity,benchmark beating and unexpected accruals

We investigate the extent to which the overvaluation hypothesis provides incentives for managers to beat earnings benchmarks, and whether this benchmark beating can be reliably interpreted as evidence of earnings management. We carefully identify firms immediately above earnings benchmarks that have a priori, overvaluation‐based incentives to achieve the benchmark. We therefore focus on benchmark‐beating observations where manipulation is most likely, providing a more powerful test of the existence of opportunistic financial reporting. Consistent with overvaluation‐related incentives encouraging earnings management, we find that overvalued firms that just exceed levels‐related earnings benchmarks have higher unexpected accruals than firms with less extreme valuations.