Purpose: This study investigates the consequences of the key audit matter (KAM) disclosure requirement by considering two salient audit proxies: audit fees and audit report lag. This investigation is relevant because most auditors worldwide are required to expand their audit report including discussion on key matters faced in the audit engagement. However, the emerging literature on the implications of KAM is inconclusive.Design/methodology/approach: Using a distinctive dataset of 601 year-observations for firms listed on the Omani capital market over 2012–2019, this study employs pooled panel data regression with robust standard error.Findings: Results indicate that auditors increased their fees considerably during the period of KAM but substantially shortened audit report lag. Conversely, using the KAM period as a sample, the authors find marginal or insignificant evidence for the effect of the number of KAM on both proxies. In additional analyses, this study shows that entity-level risk KAM is associated with higher fees and shorter audit report lag, while KAM related to account-level risk does not have the same effect. Interestingly, it is observed that KAM disclosure is strongly associated with higher fees and high-quality audit even when the auditors issue their report in a shorter time.Originality/value: This study contributes to the limited research examining the consequences of KAM in emerging markets. It is also the first to show that KAM is associated with shorter audit report lag.

Purpose: Although the effect of culture on financial reporting practices has been addressed in earlier studies, the existing empirical evidence totally neglects an important dimension in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) markets: tribal culture. The authors fill this gap in the literature using Oman as the setting.Design/methodology/approach: The authors collect data for 583 company-year observations for companies listed on the Omani capital market, 2007–2014. The authors run a two-way fixed effects panel data regression to test their hypothesis.Findings: Tribal culture has a negative effect on financial reporting quality (FRQ), measured by both accrual-based and real earnings management. The findings are robust under a variety of sensitivity analyses. In additional analysis, the findings confirm that tribal culture negatively moderates the effectiveness of internal monitoring mechanisms and is associated with low-quality auditing. Further, the authors find tribal culture associated with delayed financial information.Originality/value: To the authors' knowledge, the study makes several contributions to the literature because it is the first archival evidence linking tribal culture with FRQ. It is the first to show that the effect of corporate governance mechanisms on FRQ is moderated by tribal culture. The study has valuable implications for policymakers, regulators, boards of directors and auditors in GCC countries as well as in countries with similar cultures.

This study aims at empirically examining the association of entrepreneurial education and support with entrepreneurial intention among students in College of Business Administration at the Northern Boarder University for the academic year 2019-2020. Using data from a self-administered survey with a final sample of 266 students, the simple regression result indicates to a significantly positive association of the entrepreneurial education and support with entrepreneurial intention among College of Business Administration's students at Northern Boarder University. The results of this study should be useful to policy makers in Saudi Arabia at the country, ministry of education, the College of Business Administration, Northern Boarder University and elsewhere, as the KSA is aiming at achieving the ambitious KSA 2030 Vision.