Country- Specific Characteristics Influencing Websites Based Information Disclosure Practices

This paper aims to examine and explain the Websites- based financial disclosure practices differences between developed European countries. The development of Internet financial reporting (IFR), as a new corporate reporting practice, was rapidly exploited by large listed companies in the world. A number of accounting research was analyzed the development of online reporting in various countries and they showed that firm specific incentives are the most important factors explaining the IFR practices, however, there was ignored the importance from the politico-socio conditions, as others factors influencing the IFR practices differences (as a accounting practices). As a refinement of Gray (1988)' framework and an extension of Debrency et al. (2002) model, this study explore an empirical investigation validating the influence of culture, institutional factors on the financial disclosure level through corporate Websites in France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain and UK. It reveals the importance of technological and media presentation format as Web- based communication index component. The findings showed that environmental factors were significantly related to Websites technology index and economic development is an important factor determining the Websites financial disclosure practices differences.