The Impact of International Accounting Standards Board (IASB)'s Guidelines for Preparing Management Commentary (MC): Evidence From Italian Listed Firms

This paper investigates the Italian firms’ disclosure in response to the new guidance on the management commentary (MC) contained in the International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) practice statement issued by International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) in 2010. The study is organized as follows. After reviewing the relevant literature on financial disclosure and MC, this paper examines the content of the Italian management’s report⎯known as “Relazione sulla Gestione” and that of the recent IASB’s IFRS practice statement. Hence, it applies a self-constructed disclosure index and a multiple correspondence analysis (MCA) on MC of a sample of 66 Italian non-financial listed firms. The results show that the level of disclosures provided by the Italian listed firms does not seem to be affected by the IASB’s guidelines. However, the survey highlights large differences in the level and type of disclosure provided in MC among the sectors and firms. This paper aims to contribute to the financial reporting debate by understanding the IASB’s guidelines and their impacts on the voluntary disclosure practices of Italian listed firms.