thereby increasing its usefulness to investors. The second main finding is that these effects differ according to the institutional setting of firms adopting IAS/IFRS. Factors different from accounting regulation play a key role in determining financial reporting quality and have actually led to an application of IAS/IFRS, which is not uniform across Europe, with consequences on accounting quality both in absolute and relative terms. Empirical findings suggest that cross-country differences in accounting are also likely to remain after IAS/IFRS adoption.