ACCOUNTING INFORMATION AND VALUE RELEVANCE IN AN ECONOMY UNDER RECESSION: THE NIGERIAN EXPERIENCE

This study examined accounting information system and value relevance in accounting in an emerging economy under recession. The objective was to examine the relationship between accounting information and value relevance of commercial banks. Time series data was sourced from the financial statements and annual reports of quoted commercial banks from 2000-2015. Earnings per share and dividend per share was modeled as the function of ordinary share capital, book value of equity, earnings before interest and tax, market value of equity, cash flow and leverage ratio. Multiple regressions were formulated to explore the relationship between the variables. Model I found that all the independent variables have positive relationship with earnings per share while model II found that cash flow and leverage ratio have negative effect on dividend per share. The regression summary prove that model I have an R2 of 72.7% and 62.3%, f-statistics of 7.007 and probability of 0.000162 while model II found an R2 of 75.9% and 66.7%, f-statistics of 8.293, probability of 0.000049. From the above, we conclude that accounting information have significant relationship with value relevance among the commercial banks. The study recommend well formulated policies for the validity of accounting information that can enhance value relevance.