Expected credit losses and managerial discretion : current practices and future challenges

This paper examines the loan loss provisioning behaviour during the transition from IAS 39 to IFRS 9 for a sample of 403 banks in 27 countries in European Union. The objective of the study is to investigate whether during the first years of adoption of the new expected credit loss (ECL) impairment model banks are more encouraged to smooth earnings and manage capital, compared to the previous incurred loss (ICL) model. Results show that under ECL, banks adopt a more aggressive opportunistic behaviour in accordance with the incomesmoothing and capital management approach. Management should be aware of this to implement monitoring and control systems, increasing trustworthiness of financial information for investors' expectations. [Publisher's text].