Honors Program

Honors in Business

Date of Award

12-2014

Thesis Professor(s)

Anthony G. Masino

Thesis Professor Department

Accountancy

Thesis Reader(s)

Douglas Dotterweich, Karen Kornweibel

Abstract

The purpose of the research is developing an understanding of the effect that International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) had, if any, on Canadian Publicly Accountable Enterprises (PAEs), specifically their external financial reporting compared to Canadian Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (Canadian GAAP). The focus of this research is the analysis of reported financial ratios of Canadian Banking companies for the year ended December 31, 2010, which will be tested for the statistically-significant differences between Canadian GAAP and IFRS. The research is designed to examine what impact on liquidity, leverage, profitability, and cash flows the change from Canadian GAAP to IFRS has, if any. Overall, the results indicated that there are no statistically significant differences between IFRS and CGAAP means and medians of financial ratios. However, the IFRS conversion did cause significant differences of the leverage ratios under IFRS and CGAAP. The statistical differences were found between medians of IFRS and CGAAP of equity ratios and means of equity’s and debt ratios. The outcomes of the investigation will be useful for Canadian public companies (specifically in the banking industry), investors, stockholders, and other lenders, all of whom rely on financial ratios for various purposes such as credit decisions and debt monitoring. In addition, the United States Government and enterprises in the United States will be able to learn from Canadian experience and make informed decisions about any future changes to accounting standards.

Document Type

Honors Thesis - Open Access

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

Copyright

Copyright by the authors.

Included in

Accounting Commons

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