Authors: Stergios Athianos, Augustinos Dimitras, Nikolaos Kartalis, Athanasios Arabatzis

Title: Harmonization - Compliance of Greek Listed Companies with Accounting Practices and Methods as imposed by IAS’s 16-36-38

Abstract

In our era with the opening up of markets is becoming imperative for homogeneity of the financial statements of entities nationally and internationally. The current crisis that is going through this period of the country as well as the lack of investor confidence to financial markets necessitates the applications of uniform accounting standards.

The introduction of International Accounting Standards, when fully adopted by entities, ensures the necessary transparency needed by users of financial statements worldwide. But the problem lies in the extent to which the requirements of International Accounting Standards followed by entities during the period of this extended recession.

The objective of this paper is to investigate whether and to what extent Greek listed companies during the period of economic crisis implement the mandatory disclosure requirements as imposed by International Accounting Standards/International Financial Reporting Standards (IAS/IFRS).

A sample of fifty (50) companies listed on the Athens Stock Exchange was selected. Financial institutions and construction companies were excluded due to different structure of financial statements. The examination period span from 2009 to 2016.

The results show that the indented variables, size, leverage and ROA affect in significant statistical level the degree of compliance of the companies to mandatory disclosure requirements as imposed by IAS’s / IFRS’s.