A Comprehensive Investigation of Intra-Organizational Factors Affecting Financial Fraud: Evidence from the Tehran Stock Exchange

The main purpose of this study is to explain the effect of intra-organizational factors (firm characteristics, board structure, and audit committee structure) on financial fraud in listed firms on the Tehran Stock Exchange. In order to achieve this purpose, 1606 firm-year (146 firms for 11 years) observations collected from the annual financial reports of listed firms on the Tehran Stock Exchange during the period 2010 to 2020 have been tested. The results of logit multivariate regression analysis show that firm size, firm liquidity, firm age, firm growth opportunity, firm profitability, board independence, audit committee independence, and audit committee financial expertise have a negative and significant effect on financial fraud. However, the debt ratio and the CEO tenure have a positive and significant effect on financial fraud. The results also show that statistically board size, audit committee existence, and audit committee size do not have a significant effect on financial fraud.