R Madhumathi

Influence of institutional ownership has been hypothesised to efficiently monitor the managerial decisions especially discretionary role of managers in reporting earnings. The managers have been found to misrepresent the quality of earnings for a dividend declaration; new issue; takeovers and for affirming debt holders of their financial position. Panel data methodology focusing on firms listed in CNX 500 in National Stock Exchange empirically examines the impact of institutional ownership on the earnings management practices in India. Earnings management is measured using discretionary accounting accruals. Firms with higher institutional holdings are found to have higher earnings quality thus restricting managers from using their discretionary powers to report earnings. Institutional ownership has a negative relationship with earnings management for larger and matured firms. Growing firms are found to be having higher earnings management. Institutional investors monitor the firms and hence reduce aggressive earnings management practices within the firm. Foreign institutional ownership also has a negative relationship with earnings management.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine the impact of earnings management on capital structure across firm diversification strategies. Design/methodology/approach – The study focuses on firms operating in the manufacturing sector (diversified and focused). Panel data methodology compares diversification strategies and identifies the impact of diversification strategy with earnings management practices on capital structure decision. Findings – International and product diversified firms have lower levels of leverage than focused firms in their capital structure. Asset-based earnings management is positive for diversified (market/product) firms. Earnings management using discretionary expenditure (project based) is found to be higher for market diversified but product-focused firms. Earning smoothing method is found to be significant for focused firms and shows a negative relationship with capital structure. Originality/value – This study offers an insight into the relationship between corporate diversification, earnings management and capital structure decisions of manufacturing firms. The results provide an important contribution to accounting and strategy literature. A distinction is made between market- and product-diversified firms and influence of earnings management practices (asset-based, project-based and earnings smoothing (ESM)) on capital structure decisions. Diversified firms (market/product) tend to have lower levels of leverage than focused firms and earnings management practices within firm groups significantly influence the capital structure decisions.