Corruption disclosure practices of Islamic and conventional financial firms in Bangladesh: the moderating role of Big4

Purpose Corporate corruption reporting (CCR) is an emerging issue of the corporation for measuring transparency, integrity and accountability to the stakeholders and society. The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of CCR and financial management responsibility regarding the issue of corruption control. Design/methodology/approach To explore the influences of corruption disclosure, this study considers the keywords-based content analysis of the listed financial firms of the Dhaka Stock Exchange in Bangladesh for 2012–2016. The research considers stakeholders and theoretical legitimacy lens for discussing corporate corruption disclosure. This study identified 143 self-driven keywords by classifying, analyzing and selecting the appropriate large set of keywords from the prior literature. This study examines 247 firm-year observations of all financial firms in Bangladesh using secondary data sources. Findings The results of the hierarchical regression analysis report that financial firms following Sharia principles have a negative and significant association with CCR, while Big4 has a positive and significant influence. Moreover, the interaction effect of Big4 on the relationship between Sharia principles and CCR is negative and insignificant. The findings reported that Islamic financial firms disclose less corruption information than conventional financial firms in Bangladesh. Practical implications This study findings are expected to significantly impact corporate management and policymakers of developing and highly corrupted economies to enhance corporate accountability, transparency and reputation. The regulatory body can consider the findings to promulgate anti-corruption reporting rules and regulations. Originality/value The authors believe the theoretical lens used to support the method and findings of this paper are unique and novel.