Earnings Management by Financing Purposes

Abstract

An objective of this study is to investigate the difference of earnings management before financing by capital financing purposes. Two main methods of financing directly in capital markets are seasoned equity offerings (hereafter ‘SEO’) and issuing bonds (hereafter ‘BOND’). The purposes of financing are largely classified into working capital and investment capital. This study investigates whether the firms that need to finance for working capital are more motivated for earnings management than the firms that need to finance for investment capital. The results show that discretionary accruals before financing for working capital are greater than financing for investment capital for both SEO and BOND.