Editorial

ID: 32220

Authors: Fábio Frezatti.

Source: Revista Contabilidade & Finanças, v. 25, n. 65, p. 103-103, May-August, 2014. 1 page(s).

Document type: Editorial (Portuguese)

Inversão de papéis

ID: 32221

Authors: Eliseu Martins.

Source: Revista Contabilidade & Finanças, v. 25, n. 65, p. 105-107, May-August, 2014. 3 page(s).

Document type: Article (Portuguese)

Knowledge and assessment of logistics cost Trade-offs: a study with Brazilian professionals

ID: 32222

Authors: Juliana Ventura Amaral, Reinaldo Guerreiro.

Source: Revista Contabilidade & Finanças, v. 25, n. 65, p. 111-123, May-August, 2014. 13 page(s).

Keyword: Logistics , Logistics Costs , Logistics cost trade-offs , Total Cost

Document type: Article (Portuguese) Show Abstract

The balance between costs incurred and the service provided to the customer depends on the identification and exploitation of logistics cost trade-offs. In this sense, the goal of the present study was to identify the extent to which Brazilian logistics professionals understand and assess cost trade-offs. To this end, a questionnaire based on the theoretical framework was administered to a sample of 73 professionals at commercial and industrial companies that were included on the list of the largest Brazilian enterprises in the ‘Melhores and Maiores’ (Best and Biggest) edition of Exame Magazine. The questionnaire's reliability was ascertained using Cronbach's Alpha (90.8%), and the data thus gathered were quantitatively analyzed through descriptive statistics and the non-parametric Mann-Whitney test. The results showed that most logistics professionals know that there are trade-offs but lack a broad understanding of the concept, especially with respect to the relationship between trade-offs and total cost. Nonetheless, the knowledge that logistics have an impact on economic-financial performance appeared to be widespread for most of the sample, particularly among experienced professionals. The results also revealed that although trade-off assessments are emphasized when designing and redesigning logistics processes and networks, these assessments are still limited in regard to the formulation of specific projects. The non-use of cost simulators and lack of adequate cost information were identified as factors related to the limited assessment of trade-offs. These findings are important because they demonstrate that a company’s controllership can help logistics professionals to reverse this situation of non-assessment of trade-offs and to strive for the optimization of economic results.

Lobbying on accounting regulation: evidence from the oil industry

ID: 32223

Authors: Odilanei Morais dos Santos, Ariovaldo dos Santos.

Source: Revista Contabilidade & Finanças, v. 25, n. 65, p. 124-144, May-August, 2014. 21 page(s).

Keyword: Accounting choices , Accounting regulation , Lobbying , Oil industry

Document type: Article (Portuguese) Show Abstract

This work aims to identify the determining factors in the submission of comment letters to the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) on the discussion paper Extractive Activities as a lobbying strategy in the context of accounting regulation. The results show that size is a determining factor in all models used, indicating that large oil companies are more likely to lobby. This tendency is especially evident for companies that are predominantly opposed to the IASB proposals, which suggests that the IASB’s review/replacement of International Financial Reporting Standards 6 (IFRS 6) will be a complex process subject to pressure from oil companies to maintain the status quo.

Does Corporate Governance influence the efficiency of Brazilian companies?

ID: 32224

Authors: Igor Bernardi Sonza, Gilberto de Oliveira Kloeckner.

Source: Revista Contabilidade & Finanças, v. 25, n. 65, p. 145-160, May-August, 2014. 16 page(s).

Keyword: Agency theory , Corporate governance , Efficiency

Document type: Article (Portuguese) Show Abstract

Conflicts of interest between managers and owners is an oft-studied issue in academia, first documented by Berle and Means in 1932, which exposes the classic conflict of interest between agent and principal discussed in agency theory. The premise of corporate governance is that people in corporations do not necessarily act in funders’ best interest. Based on this assumption, this study investigates the influence of aspects of corporate governance on the efficiency of publicly traded Brazilian companies. The study combines static optimization techniques through data envelopment analysis (DEA) to identify the efficiency of publicly traded companies, using panel data to identify the influence of corporate governance on company efficiency. The data were manually collected from 20-F reports from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for Brazilian companies that had American depositary receipts (ADRs) because the database is not entirely available in Brazil. Many of the hypotheses were confirmed, thereby showing the particular conditions of corporate finance in Brazil with respect to corporate governance. The immaturity of the Brazilian capital market is perceived in various analyses, emphasizing that the history of the Brazilian corporate system is one of the limiting factors of the efficiency of companies. The conditions that prevail are the following: (i) high ownership-management overlap; (ii) boards with low effectiveness; (iii) in family groups, the poor definitions of the roles of stockholders, boards and management; (iv) the lack of clarity related to the cost-benefit relationship for good governance; (v) inefficiency of the boards of directors and (vi) evidence of conflicts of interests, diminished by explicit and implicit incentives.

Mandatory IFRS adoption in Brazil (2010): index of compliance with disclosure requirements and some explanatory factors of firms reporting

ID: 32225

Authors: Edilene Santana Santos, Vera Maria Rodrigues Ponte, Patrícia Vasconcelos Rocha Mapurunga.

Source: Revista Contabilidade & Finanças, v. 25, n. 65, p. 161-176, May-August, 2014. 16 page(s).

Keyword: Brazil , Compliance , Explanatory factors , IFRS , Mandatory disclosure

Document type: Article (Portuguese) Show Abstract

We evaluated firms’ compliance with required International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) disclosure in the first mandatory adoption year of IFRS in Brazil (2010), by comprehensively examining 638 disclosure required items from 28 encompassing IFRSs in the Notes to Financial Statements of all (366) Brazilian non-financial corporations listed on the Brazilian stock exchange (BM&FBovespa). We measured disclosure compliance levels by calculating the respective index, both overall and for each standard, and investigated associations between disclosure levels and firm’s characteristics as potential explanatory disclosure compliance factors. Our findings showed overall low levels of disclosure compliance in the analyzed year: the average level of compliance with IFRS required disclosure was very sensitive to the approach employed, varying from 16.04% (strict criterion and dichotomous approach) to 33.72% (tolerant criterion and partial compliance unweighted approach). In line with other countries experience illustrated by the international literature, these results emphasize the importance of increasing institutional support conditions for enhanced enforcement mechanisms, enabling the Brazilian firms to better attain the full economic benefits of IFRS adoption. In all our analyses, company size and “Big 4” auditing were positively associated with the dependent variable, independent of the model employed to determine the compliance disclosure index, making it possible to conclude that these factors produce a significant positive impact on compliance with the IFRS disclosure requirement levels of Brazilian firms.

A Game Theory approach to stock lending transactions in the Brazilian stock market

ID: 32226

Authors: Kym Marcel Martins Ardison, Luciana de Andrade Costa.

Source: Revista Contabilidade & Finanças, v. 25, n. 65, p. 177-188, May-August, 2014. 12 page(s).

Keyword: Bargaining games , Interest on equity , Stock lending

Document type: Article (Portuguese) Show Abstract

In Brazil’s market, the institution of interest on equity transactions provides a precedent for gains resulting from the difference between the tax rates of individuals (natural person) and those of investment funds through structured transactions. This difference creates incentives to lend stock; on the eve of an interest payment on equity, individual investors lend their stock to investment funds, which receive the interest in full and return only 85% of its value to the investors. Our goal is to understand how the surplus generated in this tax arbitration is split among the agents involved in the stock-lending transaction and to determine whether there are conditions under which the agents would have no incentive to conduct such a transaction. Using a non-cooperative games approach, we have structured this transaction and analyzed possible subgame perfect Nash equilibriums in three situations: (1) a direct relationship between the investor and the investment fund and an absence of transaction costs; (2) a direct relationship between the investor and the investment fund and the presence of transaction costs; (3) a relationship between the investor and the investment fund through a broker and the presence of (lower) transaction costs. In the cases in which the broker does not mediate the relationship, more contracts tend to be signed, but the fund’s gain will only cover the record-keeping costs of the transaction. This situation is reversed in the presence of high transaction costs: in extreme cases, the investor loses bargaining power and his/her gain compensates only for his/her risk aversion. When a broker is introduced into stock lending, only those investors who have a minimum amount of stock will receive offers from the fund through the broker. The fund’s gain tends to decrease due to the broker’s presence and in some situations, the investor loses bargaining power and accepts any contract that compensates for his/her risk aversion.

Volatility and return forecasting with High-Frequency and GARCH Models: evidence for the Brazilian market

ID: 32227

Authors: Flávio de Freitas Val, Antonio Carlos Figueiredo Pinto, Marcelo Cabus Klotzle.

Source: Revista Contabilidade & Finanças, v. 25, n. 65, p. 189-201, May-August, 2014. 13 page(s).

Keyword: HAR , Intraday return , Realized volatility , Volatility estimation

Document type: Article (Portuguese) Show Abstract

Based on studies developed over recent years about the use of high-frequency data for estimating volatility, this article implements the Heterogeneous Autoregressive (HAR) model developed by Andersen, Bollerslev, and Diebold (2007) and Corsi (2009), and the Component (2-Comp) model developed by Maheu and McCurdy (2007) and compare them with the Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity (GARCH) family models in order to estimate volatility and returns. During the period analyzed, the models using intraday data obtained better returns forecasts of the assets assessed, both in and out-of-sample, thus confirming these models possess important information for a variety of economic agents.