The Concurrent Effects of IFRS Mandate and Formal Institutional Quality on the Aftermarket Performance of IPO Firms in Emerging Countries

Abstract

This paper provides the first empirical investigation seeking to find whether International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) mandate, changes in the quality of formal institutions, or, the concurrent effect of these two elements can explain the ongoing phenomenon of the aftermarket performance difference of Initial Public Offerings (IPO) firms. We perceive little awareness of the concurrent effect of IFRS mandate and the quality of formal institutions in emerging countries, although these nations account for more than half of the IFRS mandating countries. We employ numerous Difference-in-Differences (DiD) models utilizing reliable IPO and formal institutional data for Saudi Arabia from 2005 to 2017. Our empirical results show that the absence of IFRS influence in the aftermarket performance of IPO firms led us to posit that the quality of formal institutions is the key player in influencing long-term performance of IPO firms in Saudi Arabia. We uncover evidence showing that an improvement in formal institutional quality increases the long-term performance of IPO firms. We find no evidence of a concurrent effect of changes in formal institutional quality and IFRS mandate on the aftermarket performance of IPO firms. Our results show that what does really matter in relation to the aftermarket performance of IPO firms in Saudi Arabia, are the enhancements in the level of formal institutional quality. Our results provide some important implications for IFRS-IPO research.