The effects of corporate governance mechanisms on earnings management of listed firms in Nigeria

This study basically examined the effects of corporate governance mechanism on earnings management in Nigeria. To achieve the objectives of this study, a total of 40 listed firms in the Nigerian stock exchange market were selected and analyzed for this study using the judgmental sampling technique. The choice of the selected firms arises based on the nature and extent of corporate financial failures and scandals that has been withnessed in the industry overtime. Also, the corporate annual reports for the period 2007-2011 were used for the study. The regression analysis method was employed as a statistical technique for analysing the data collected from the annual report of the selected firms. Findings from the study revealed that while board size and board independence have a significant negative impact on earnings management (proxied by discretionary accruals); On the other hand, CEO duality had a significant positive impact on earnings management for the sampled firms in Nigeria. Hence the paper concludes that firms with larger boards and diverse knowledge are more likely to be more effective in constraining earnings management than smaller boards since they are likely to have more independent directors with more corporate or financial expertise.