Multinationality–Earnings, Efficiency, and Market Considerations

The impact of multinationality on the operations of a firm is clear and strong. Riahi-Belkaoui shows how it affects the known relationships between earnings, efficiency, disclosure, and market valuation by its role as a dependent, moderating, intervening antecedant or consequent variable. Its impact can be felt, for example, in relationships and phenomena such as timeliness and the informativeness of earnings, the underreaction of securities analysts, post-earnings announcement drifts, and the level and quality of disclosure. An understanding of multinationality in the earnings-disclosure-efficiency-market valuation relationship can also be used by accountants and researchers in their daily activities, and by corporate executives in multinational organizational decision making. The result is a useful, probing exploration for academics and practitioners alike.