هل البنوك في المملكة العربية السعودية واستراليا تفصح عن معلومات ذات قيمة في التقارير السنوية؟

The main aim of this paper is to investigate to what extent banks in Saudi Arabia and Australia follow the benchmarks of the Value Reporting Framework published by the PricewaterhouseCoopers, namely: Market Overview, Strategy, Value Creating Activities and Financial Performance. An archival method has been used to evaluate the existence of the PricewaterhouseCoopers' elements in the annual reports of the chosen banks. Therefore, two publicly traded banks from each country have been randomly selected and the latest annual reports have been obtained for each bank. The selected Australian banks are Westpac Bank and Commonwealth Bank and the selected Saudi banks are Alrajhi Bank and Saudi American Bank.

The results were amazing with fair value reporting for all banks, especially for the Commonwealth Bank. The financial performance segment in the Value Reporting Framework was given the highest score (59%) in which means that the banks concerned more about their financial positions, risk profiles, economic performances, segmental analyses and accounting policies. The market overview segment in the Value Reporting Framework was the second highest score (54%) in for all banks showing that the banks also were conscious to the importance of the competitive, regulatory and macro environments in their reports. An average score of 51% were given to all banks. The two Australian banks are generally better then the Saudi banks in their reporting and show more fair value reporting. Commonwealth Bank was mostly given higher scores than Westpac. Commonwealth Bank is giving a very good example in providing comprehensive information in their Annual Report.