Current corporate financial disclosure practices in the Middle East

Corporate financial disclosure is one of the processes through which an organization communicates with the outside world. The purpose of the paper is to examine the degree of corporate disclosure in the Middle-East utilizing data from Iranian companies. Economic iiberalization, globalization of enterprises, mergers, acquisitions and deregulation have spread rapidly in the Middle East. The case of Iran is of particular interest, not only because of recent changes in the business environment and financial reporting requirements, but also, because of the Iranian government liberalization, consideration was given to reforms to commercial accounting. Using disclosure index, we found that the level ofdisclosure (62%) is comparable with the developed countries. The outcome of the research shows the disclosure level is the same for all industry categories and also there is no difference on the level of disclosure between companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE) and unlisted companies.