Abstract
The relationships between earnings, accruals, and cash flows for selected Latin American countries (Mexico, Chile, and Argentina) are investigated in this study from 1990 to 2009. We find a negative relationship between accruals and cash flow across decile portfolios. More importantly, firms reporting the highest level of accruals, have the worst level of cash flows, but not the worst level of earnings. This relationship is of economic importance given that investors are very oriented towards firms yielding high earnings and might fail to realize that earnings are not always accompanied by strong levels of cash flows. Results are disaggregated by years and countries, and compared to previous results for U.S. firms.