Accounting Manipulations and Performance of Corporate Firms in Nigeria

Abstract

This paper focused on accounting manipulation and performance of corporate firms in Nigeria. Specifically, the study examined the causes of accounting manipulation, evaluated the influence of accounting regulation bodies and principle on accounting manipulation and investigates if there is a substantial impact of accounting manipulation on performance of corporate firms in Nigeria. A survey design was adopted to gather primary data for the study. The entire auditors and accountants in corporate firms in Nigeria were the population for the study. Questionnaire was used to gather data for the study. One hundred and seventy (170) respondents comprised of 120 Accountants and 50 Auditors were selected for the study on the basis of Simple Random Sampling Technique. Also, from the 170 copies of questionnaire distributed to the respondents, only one hundred and fifty (150) copies were eventually retrieved and used for the study. Both descriptive statistics of mean and standard deviation and inferential statistics of Ordinary least Square were employed to analyze the data. The result of the study revealed that there were causes of accounting
manipulation in corporate firms. It was found that accounting regulation and principles had a great influence on accounting manipulation. The result obtained indicated that accounting manipulation had a substantial impact on performance of firms in Nigeria. It was concluded that accounting manipulation negatively influenced performance of corporate firms and recommended that effective policies should be put in place by corporate firms in order to reduce the incidence of accounting manipulation.