Compliance with IFRS 16 Mandatory Presentation and Disclosure Requirements and Company Characteristics: Evidence from an Emerging Market

This paper investigates the level of compliance with IFRS 16 (Leases) Mandatory Presentation and Disclosure Requirements (MPDR) and its association with the company characteristics in Bahrain as one of the emerging markets employing both new institutional theory and positive accounting theory. Using data of all 42 companies listed on Bahraini stock market in 2018, the year before the mandatory application of IFRS 16, to test whether the listed companies have early adopted the IFRS 16, and in 2019, the first year of mandatory application, to test the level of compliance with the standard MPDR and its association with the company characteristics.
To measure the compliance score, for each company, with IFRS 16 MPDR, I constructed a checklist based on this standard text issued by IASB and the checklists developed by the big four auditing firm. This checklist was constructed in three parts including fifty-one items if a company is lessee and lessor and 37 items if a company is lessee only. To measure the association between the compliance level and MPDR, five main hypotheses represent company characteristics were formulated and tested using the regression analysis.
This study documented that the average compliance score with IFRS 16 MPDR was 58.72% with a maximum of 83% and minimum of 15%. Our results also indicated that the level of compliance with IFRS 16 MPDR was positively and significantly associated with the company size, audit quality and profitability. On the other hand, leverage was not associated with that level of compliance and the industry type was associated which suggests that each industry sector provides different compliance level with IFRS 16 MPDR.
This study represents a seminal research that measured the level of compliance with MPDR for IFRS 16 through developing an integrated compliance checklist. It contributes to the literature by expanding the compliance research in mandatory setting. It provides empirical evidence about the compliance level with MPDR of IFRS 16. The results of this study are, of interest to academics, investors, creditors, financial analysts, government, and practitioners such as mangers and auditors.