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Purpose The increasing incidence of fraudulent financial reporting by firms in recent years raises concerns about investors' confidence in capital markets. Academicians and industry practitioners adopt diverse risk management techniques to detect fraudulent reporting of financial statements. This paper aims to determine the effectiveness of the Beneish M-score and Altman Z-score models for the early detection of material misstatements at Comscore, Inc., a media analytics firm in the United States of America. Design/methodology/approach The financial statements of Comscore Inc. from 2012 to 2018 were analyzed with the primary objective of early fraud detection by employing the Beneish M-score and the Altman Z-score. Findings The study’s outcomes indicate that the Beneish M-score is less predictable in fraud detection compared to the Altman Z-score. The study results did not confirm the efficacy of the Beneish model in predicting fraudulent financial statements. The study concludes that the choice of forensic tool greatly influences fraud detection outcomes. Practical Implication The research findings can guide the policy decision-making of investors, financial auditors, and forensic auditors as this study provides some evidence of the effectiveness of forensic tools in the detection of financial statement fraud in corporate entities. Originality/value This is the first study to apply these two widely used tools to the most recent big corporate scandal: Comscore, Inc.

Working capital management (WCM) is a key factor in the success of manufacturing companies when credit is restricted, as is the case in the current climate caused by the COVID-19 crisis. The main purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between working capital management, earnings quality, sales growth, and shareholders’ wealth of listed manufacturing firms in Oman. The study used balanced panel data of 31 manufacturing firms listed on the Muscat Stock Exchange (MSE) from 2004 to 2019. The study reveals that days in working capital, cash conversion cycle, payable deferred period, sales growth, and earnings quality positively affects shareholder’s wealth proxied by the return on assets, whereas, days in working capital have a negative effect on return on assets. Similarly, working capital management was found to have no influence on the earnings per share (EPS). It was also documented that sales growth and earnings quality positively impacted EPS. The study concluded that improving sales growth and earnings quality would result in shareholders’ wealth creation. The results are helpful to manufacturing companies to improve their business performance and social welfare through a direct and indirect chain of raising investments, pay, and production scales. This study adds knowledge to the body of literature on working capital management, earnings quality, and sales growth in the areas of methodology, the impact of WCM components on manufacturing firms’ shareholder value, and socioeconomic evidence from Oman.

As argued by Modigilani &Miller, the dividends are irrelevant only in perfect markets but in an emerging market like India, the dividends are expected to show its relevance. Indian capital market have surpassed a sea change in the recent past including demonetization, implementation of new tax regimes, political controversies and the like. Despite these facts, the Indian capital markets soars at many a times due to its active trading. Against this backdrop, this research paper seeks to examine the relationship between dividend policies and share price volatility. The motivation behind this research is to first time employ a powerful unbiased volatility estimator, created by Yang and Zhang that is 14 times as efficient as close to close estimate. A sample of 116 textiles companies, listed and actively traded in Bombay Stock Exchange of India (BSE) from 2008 to 2017 selected for the study. In examining the impact of dividend policy on share price volatility in Indian capital market, multiple least squares regressions is employed. Empirical results shows that dividends are affecting stock prices variations in India which fits in with the bird in hand and signaling theories of dividends. Due to the volatile nature of the market, Indian investors' prefer demanding more dividends from firms rather keeping retained earnings on reinvestment. The outcomes of this study supports the fact that dividends policy influence stock price variations in Indian capital market. The results of this study provides an insight to the financial managers in developing their dividend policies to maximizing the shareholders wealth.

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