Political connections, Accounting Information Quality:Evidence of Financial Restatement

Because of the benefits of political connections and lower necessity of responding to market pressures to increase information quality by politically connected firms, it is expected that these firms will provide low-quality accounting information. With respect to the extended role of government in Iranian economy, this study aims to investigate the relationship between political connections and accounting information quality in the listed firms in the Tehran Exchange Stock (TSE). The statistical sample includes 101 listed firms in the TSE between the years 2010 to 2018. Financial restatement and intensity of financial restatement are used as the criterions of low quality of accounting information. To achieve the research objectives, two hypotheses have been proposed and to test the hypotheses logistic regression and multiple linear regression analysis in a panel data mode were conducted. The results show a positive relationship between political connections and occurrence and intensity of financial restatement. Therefore, it seems that the firms' accounting information quality is impacted by their political connections.