R.W. McGee (ed.), Corporate Governance in Developing Economies, DOI 10.1007/978-0-387-84833-4_13, © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2009 Chapter 13 Corporate Governance and the Timeliness of Financial Reporting: A Comparative Study of Kenya and Russia Judith Muhoro, Robert W. McGee, Michael Tyler and Thomas Tarangelo Introduction It is important to report financial information in a timely fashion. The longer a com- pany waits to release its annual report and accompanying financial statements, the more stale the information is and the less useful it is. A number of studies have been done on various aspects of timeliness in financial reporting. Those studies will not be summarized here but a listing is provided in the reference section for further research. Various organizations have cited the importance of timely financial reporting. The Accounting Principles Board (1970) addressed the issue in one of its state- ments. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD, 2004) lists it as an important principle of corporate governance. The World Bank has conducted more than 40 studies on corporate governance in various countries that have included a look at their financial reporting practices, including timeliness. However, Kenya was not among the countries studied. The present study replicates studies that have measured the timeliness of financial reporting in Russia (McGee, 2006, 2007a, 2007b, 2007c, 2008; McGee & Gunn, 2008; McGee & Tarangelo, 2008; McGee & Tyler, 2008; McGee, Tarangelo, & Tyler, 2008; McGee, Tyler, Tarangelo, & Igoe, 2008; McGee, Yuan, Tyler, & 119 J. Muhoro () St. Paul’s University, Limuru, Kenya e-mail: nduturas@yahoo.com R.W. McGee () Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA e-mail: bob414@hotmail.com M. Tyler () Barry University. Miami Shores, FL, USA e-mail: bob414@hotmail.com T. Tarangelo () Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA e-mail: tarangel@fiu.edu