How do you mean Sustainability 'of' information? What is CIS?

the question is not very clear to me. please give some detail for a right answer.

I am answering the first part of the question. There is no single method of measuring quality of financial reports. Researchers generally use their own method and every researcher used more than one method. Corporate accruals is one of them. I used  three methods for assessing the quality of financial reporting in my paper which is yet to be published. 

CIS is Comprehensiveness of Sustainability Information

Hi Adeyemi, this is a long answer and hope it helps.

1. It all depends on what you want to do with reporting quality. You could be an advanced researcher trying to compute earnings persistence by regressions such as

Earningst+1 = a0 + a1Earningst + e

Earningst+1 = g0+ g1Accrualst + g2Cash Flowst + e

2. Or you maybe just an ordinary user who is wondering how financial reporting is detected on the phase of financial reports. In that case you may read

Thomas, R. and Paul, M. (2004). Financial Reporting Quality: Red Flags and Accounting .

Warning Signs. http://www.accessmylibrary.com

Where they define high financial reporting quality as overall financial reporting, including disclosures, which results in a fair presentation of a company's operations (including both earnings and cash flow) and financial

position. Low financial reporting quality, on the other hand, can result from a variety of activities,including the following:

* Following GAAP but selecting alternatives within GAAP that bias or distort reported results to achieve a

desired outcome (e.g., selecting a depreciation method that results in higher earnings than the economic

depreciation of the assets warrant).

* Using loopholes or bright-lines in accounting principles (e.g., the lessee has a capital lease if the present

value of the lease payments is 90 percent or more of the fair value of the property) to structure

transactions to achieve a desired outcome that differs from the economic structure of the transaction

(e.g., that allows a lessor to structure a lease solely to qualify for immediate sales treatment while still

allowing the lessee to treat it as an off-balance-sheet arrangement).

* Using unrealistic or inappropriate estimates and assumptions to achieve a desired outcome (e.g., using

extraordinarily long depreciable lives for assets or unrealistically optimistic assumptions about collectibility

of receivables and loans).

* Stretching accounting principles to achieve a desired outcome (e.g., using a narrowly defined rule on

consolidation of special-purpose entities (SPEs) for a leasing transaction to justify nonconsolidation of

SPEs in other types of transactions).

* Engaging in fraudulent financial reporting. Rather than low financial reporting quality, this category

actually has no financial reporting quality.

3. Analysts state sources of accounting discretion as:

• Revenue recognition

• Allowance for doubtful accounts and related provision for bad debts

• Depreciation choices

• Inventory choices

• Choices related to goodwill and other noncurrent assets

• Choices related to taxes

• Pension choices

• Financial asset/liability valuation

• Stock option expense estimates

4.Or you may be referring to the IASB framework that considers two fundamental characteristics (Faithfulness and relevance) or 4 enhancing qualities (Comparability, Verifiability, Under stability, Timeliness ). It is cautioned that compliance with IFRS alone does not imply financial reporting quality.

5. I seem to understand that you want to determine the reliability of financial information and how sustainable they are. And this has nothing to do with sustainability reporting associated with triple bottom line. You will most likely look at the earnings quality of the listed companies and maybe verge into earnings persistence. Published papers in this area include:

1. Dechow, P., Ge, W. and Schrand C. (2009) Understanding earnings quality: A review of the

proxies, their determinants and their consequences.

http://mitsloan.mit.edu/jae/pdf/Session_I_Dechow_Ge_Schrand.pdf

2. Dichev, Ilia D. and Graham, John R. and Harvey, Campbell R. and Rajgopal, Shivaram, Earnings Quality: Evidence from the Field (May 7, 2013). Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2103384 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2103384

I can forward these papers if you cannot access them.

Goodluck Erick Outa

Thanks for the detailed comments, Goodluck Erick Outa. I appreciate if those papers can be forwarded to me.

Dear Adeyemi.

With regard to sustainability reporting, you may find the following publication helpful: Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) (2013), Reporting Principles and Standard Disclosures, https://www.globalreporting.org/resourcelibrary/GRIG4-Part1-Reporting-Principles-and-Standard-Disclosures.pdf

You can find further ressources of the Global Reporting Initiative here: https://www.globalreporting.org

Paul