Influence of corporate attributes on forward-looking information disclosure in publicly traded Turkish corporations

The purpose of this study is to determine the extent of forward-looking information disclosure in publicly traded Turkish corporations, and to identify drivers of disclosure. Through content analysis of annual reports, we identified the level of forward-looking information disclosure in Turkish listed manufacturing companies. According to the results, forward-looking disclosure level is not high among Turkish companies currently; the majority of the disclosures are qualitative; and while all firms spread good news, no one discloses the bad ones. Furthermore, the results indicate that firm size and auditor size are the significant variables in explaining forward-looking information disclosure level; other five variables (i.e. profitability, leverage, ownership structure, independent directors, listing age) are insignificant. (C) 2012 Published by Elsevier Ltd. Selection and/or peer review under responsibility of Prof. Dr. Huseyin Arasli