ABSTRACT

This study examined the effect of creative accounting on the performance of Access Bank

Nigeria Plc with the purpose of determining the motive behind the practice of creative

accounting in the Access Bank Nigeria Plc, to ascertain whether creative accounting has

contributed to Access Banks' distress in Nigeria, and to examine measures that could curb the

practice ir the Access Bank Nigeria Plc. Primary source of data collection was employed in this

study and statistical tools used to analyze the data were the Yaro Yarnane test and the multiple

regression analysis. The result of this study revealed that the major reason for creative

accounting practices in the Access Bank Nigeria Plc was to inflate the operating costs to reduce

exposure to taxes. It was further found that other key reasons for creative accounting practice in

the Access Bank Nigeria Plc include: to help maintain or boost the share price by reducing the

apparent levels of borrowing, making the company appear subject to less risk and of a good

profit trend , to inflate the amount of operating costs in order to reduce exposure to taxes, to

report a steady trend of growth in profit, rather than slow volatile profits with a series of dramatic

rises and falls, and to effect changes in accounting policies in order to discourage findings faults

in the company's accounting system. It was observed that that creative accounting has significant

impact on Access Bank Nigeria Plc distress in Nigeria and it was further observed that effective

measures can curb the practice of creative accounting in Access Bank Nigeria Plc. Based on the

findings the study recommends that creative accounting should be considered a serious crime,

accountants in Access Bank and other sectors in general should hold high ethical standards and

maintain integrity in all their professional dealings. Also, this study advocates for the

introduction of forensic accounting practice which can serve as an investigative function and

experts witnessing in access bank Nigerian Plc.