Identification and Refinement of Effective Factors of Financial Reporting Transparency of Firms Listed on Iran Stock Exchange

This study aimed to identify effective factors of financial reporting transparency (FRT) of companies using knowledge analysis and selected the final effective factors from them using the ANP analytic network process. In this regard, 16 professors and pundits in financial and reporting areas were selected as the experts. Then, these factors were assessed, refined, and categorized in three survey stages using Delphi method. First, 20 factors were extracted from the literature review based on the knowledge and content analysis: institutional ownership, independence of the board of directors, the lack of ownership concentration, size of the board of directors, information quality, information accuracy, profit fluctuation, sales margin, return on assets, return on investment, asset turnover, company value, competition, age of company, size of company, technology, current ratio, quick ratio, cash flow and asset liquidity. Further, the identified factors were categorized, assessed and refined based on the survey results from the experts’ opinions using Delphi and ANP analytic network process methods. Results showed following 10 out of 20 factors, identified using the content and knowledge analysis, as the effective factors of FRT: institutional ownership and independence of the board of directors (corporate governance mechanisms), information accuracy and profit fluctuation (financial analysis), return on assets and return on investment (financial performance), competition and age of company (environment), and cash flow and asset liquidity (liquidity).