The Relationship between Environmental Uncertainty and manager's Use of Discretionary Accruals among Listed Firms in the Tehran's Stock Exchange

The aim of this research is to investigate the way environmental uncertainty affect firms’ performance and profitability and managers’ tools for avoiding its negative consequences. It is generally assumed that environmental uncertainty causes many fluctuations in firms’ performance and profitability and to avoid its negative consequences, managers carry out income smoothing using discretionary accruals. In the present research, data was analyzed annually, for 1380-87 time period. To test hypotheses, five multivariate regression models were employed.In the current study, to calculate discretionary accruals, model of Kothari et al was used and coefficient of variation of sales was considered as a criterion for environmental uncertainty of firms belonged to our studied sample. Findings indicate that environmental uncertainty creates many fluctuations in firms’ performance and profitability and to avoid its negative consequences, managers perform reported income smoothing using discretionary accruals