What is the Real State of Financial Management in Companies in the Republic of Serbia?

Abstract: Research Question: This paper focuses on the basic financial decision making practices of domestic companies and their knowledge of the operational risk management concept. Motivation: Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) play a significant role in the company’s development and achieving the company’s objectives (Van Horne & Wachowicz, 2007). Different authors carry out research based on one of the fields of finances-related decision making, like Graham & Harvey, 2001. The goal of this research is to show that difference in decision making process on companies’ finances and risk management depends on the company’s ownership structure. Idea: The paper is aimed at the recognition of differences found in corporate decision making, relating both to capital budgeting and capital structure, dividend payout policy and risk management concept, depending on the ownership structure. Data: During the first half of 2016, a research consisting of the 392-companies sample operating in the Republic of Serbia was conducted, including all four listed fields concerning their economic operations. Nevertheless, only a total of 54 CFOs completed and handed back the distributed questionnaires. Tools: Some basic descriptive statistics techniques, one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Kruskal-Wallis test were applied throughout the complete data analysis, while data processing involved the use of standard statistical package IBM SPSS 20.0. Findings: As shown by research findings, there is a notable difference in decision making, both on dividend payout and on risk management concept, depending on the types of ownership, with companies operating in our domestic market. The future research will concentrate on practice of companies merging both domestic and foreign entities, in order to determine whether a similar pattern might be found. Contribution: Furthermore, the research is intended to be complemented by the data contained in the official financial reports of those companies, with a view to ascertaining if the statements made by their CFOs are actually applied in the corporate practice.