Does the Latin model of corporate governance perform worse than other models in preventing earnings management?

Traditionally, the Latin model of corporate governance had been a predominant model in some countries; however, this model is increasingly becoming out of fashion. Using a database of Portuguese and Brazilian firms, we investigated whether the Latin model performs worse than other models (i.e. variants of the Continental and Anglo-Saxon models) in terms of preventing earnings management. We conclude that, in general, companies that adopt the Latin model have lower levels of earnings management than other companies and that switching from the Latin model to another model does not cause a generalized decrease in the level of discretionary accruals. Additionally, firms that move away from the Latin model are not predominantly those with extremely high levels of discretionary accruals.