Does sharing the same network auditor in group affiliated firms affect audit quality?

We contribute to the literature on audit quality by examining whether sharing the same network auditor among group affiliated firms is related to lower or higher audit quality in China. We find that choosing the same network audit firm among group affiliated firms is associated with more sanctions by regulators regarding fraudulent financial reporting, higher abnormal accruals, larger standard deviation of abnormal accruals, higher likelihood of a downward restatement in earnings, and lower likelihood of receiving a going concern modified opinion. We further identify contexts that moderate audit quality. Higher audit quality is associated with the use of a specialist auditor and firms that operate in more homogeneous industries. Lower audit quality is associated with longer auditor tenure (more than five years), greater geographic distance between a parent company and its subsidiaries, and greater control by a parent company over its subsidiaries.     

Does high frequency algorithmic trading matter for non-AT investors?

The extant literature has typically measured the impact of high frequency algorithmic trading (HFT) on short term outcomes, in seconds or minutes. We focus on outcomes of concern for longer term non-algorithm investors. We find in some cases HFT increases volatility arising from news relating to fundamentals. Furthermore HFT is associated with the transmission of that volatility across industries, and that transmission is based on short term correlations. Finally, we find that the period since the introduction of algorithmic trading (AT) has seen increases in both the variances and covariances of return volatility in most industries. However increases in the variances has not been uniform in that it has fallen sharply in a few industries. The magnitudes are such that, overall, AT has coincided with reduced return volatility variance.     

Does the investment horizon of institutional investors matter for stock liquidity?

This paper examines the role of the investment horizon of institutional investors on stock liquidity of firms. We show that an increase in long-term institutional ownership is negatively associated with firm liquidity, while an increase in short-term ownership is positively related to a firm's stock liquidity. We identify the ownership-liquidity relationship by examining two major channels: the trading activity channel and the informational friction channel. Long-term investors reduce stock liquidity through low frequency trading and access to value-enhancing and private information, which induces adverse selection bias. In contrast, short-term investors improve liquidity through trading activity and competition with other investors, which lowers transaction costs. Our findings further suggest that the effects of an increase in long-term (short-term) institutional investors on liquidity weaken (strengthen) when a firm has more publicly available information. Finally, we show that the positive impact of an increase in long-term ownership on valuation is more pronounced for firms with higher liquidity and the valuation effect is persistent.     

Is mandated independence necessary for audit quality?

Independence (in fact as well as in appearance) is widely thought to be necessary for the quality of audits, and audit quality is often equated with independence. Private incentives to demand (and supply) independent certification of financial statements are thought to be insufficient, thus the need to mandate independence through regulation. This study presents data from a field experiment on the unregulated market for certification of baseball cards to assess the role of independence vis-à-vis other auditor attributes such as competence, price, and service on audit quality. In our field experiment, we examine prices of baseball cards sold on eBay with or without third party certification. In addition, the certifier was either independent or deeply immersed in providing other services to market participants. We find that market participants pay a significant premium for certified cards. Certifiers who are deeply immersed (and therefore apparently less independent) also provide higher quality service in the form of being stricter graders, command larger price premiums, and dominate in market share. Implications for independence and audit quality are discussed.     

Do employee-friendly firms invest more efficiently? Evidence from labor investment efficiency

We investigate the impact of employee treatment on labor investment efficiency. We provide evidence that employee-friendly treatment is significantly associated with lower deviations of labor investment from the level justified by economic fundamentals, i.e., higher labor investment efficiency. The effect of employee treatment on labor investment efficiency is stronger for firms that are human-capital-intensive, with more skilled labor and knowledge capital, and those that face higher product market competition. Using the 2008–2009 financial crisis as an external shock and applying the difference-in-difference method, we also show that employee-friendly firms have higher labor investment efficiency in the post-financial crisis period, but experience more inefficient labor investments during the crisis. Our results are robust to placebo tests, selection bias, propensity score matching, alternative explanations, alternative proxies for both employee treatment and labor investment efficiency as well as the adjustment for using residuals as dependent variables, additional control variables, and various approaches in addressing endogeneity issues.     

Do auditors’ early-life socioeconomic opportunities improve audit quality? Evidence from China

Prior research documents significant variation in audit outcomes based on individual auditors' demographic features, working experience, educational background, and social connections. This study examines whether individual auditors' early-life socioeconomic opportunities also affect audit practices. We expect that auditors from big cities have more access to socioeconomic opportunities and accumulate more human capital in early life, thus are more capable of providing high-quality audits after they start careers. Consistent with this hypothesis, we find that auditors from big cities make more audit adjustments to earnings compared with auditors from small towns. Additional tests suggest that this early-life effect on audit quality is moderated when auditors receive higher education or gain more auditing experience and is more pronounced in downward adjustments than in upward adjustments. We also find a fee premium for auditors from big cities. Overall, this paper provides evidence that auditors’ early-life socioeconomic opportunities have a far-reaching influence on audit quality.     

Disclosure quality vis-à-vis disclosure quantity: Does audit committee matter in Omani financial institutions?

Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting - We examine the impact of audit committee (AC) characteristics (e.g. AC foreign members, AC female members, AC members with multiple directorships, AC...     

Does carbon emission of firms matter for Bank loans decision? Evidence from China

In the context of global climate governance, greater carbon emissions of enterprises often result in a higher potential risk of environmental violations. Taking the non-financial companies listed in China from 2008 to 2018 as research samples, this paper empirically examined the impact of firm carbon emission on their acquisition of new bank loans and its mechanism of action. This paper empirically finds that if the carbon emission of an enterprise is higher, it will be granted with less new bank loans. The results remain robust after pairing analysis and instrumental variable analysis. The mechanism analysis shows that corporate credit rating plays a significant moderating role in the relationship between corporate carbon emission and new bank loans. Carbon emission leads to the improvement of earnings management of enterprises and the significant decline in the conservatism and comparability of accounting information, which is likely to be an important channel for the reduction of corporate bank loans. Upon further analysis, we find that the carbon emission of enterprises will not significantly affect the cost of acquiring bank loans, but it will significantly reduce the loan term structure. The cross-sectional analysis shows that the effect of carbon emission on new bank loans is more obvious in state-owned listed enterprises, enterprises with high internal control quality and enterprises with strong environmental law enforcement. The research results of this paper enrich the research on the economic consequences of carbon emission, reveal the implementation effect of green credit policies, provide empirical evidence for bank credit to play a role in green governance, and promote enterprises to actively reduce carbon emission.     

Does order backlog matter for financial reporting quality? Evidence from revenue restatements

In this study, we investigate the relationship between revenue recognition restatements and order backlog. Order backlog, a leading indicator of future earnings, is defined as the monetary value of unfilled orders at year-end. The presence of an order backlog can be economically significant and can have positive or negative implications. However, it is not clear whether there is an association between order backlog and financial reporting quality and, if there is, whether the relationship is negative or positive. Our results suggest that revenue recognition restatements are more likely to occur when order backlogs or changes in order backlogs are significant. Additionally, firms just meeting an earnings target when they have greater order backlog changes, and firms with a higher deferred-revenue-to-order-backlog ratio, are more likely to restate revenue. Finally, audit firms with more experience auditing companies with average backlogs above the median mitigate the association between backlogs and revenue restatements. Hence, financial statement users and auditors should use more skepticism in reviewing financial statements when firms have order backlogs.     

Does corporate diversification reduce value in high technology firms?

We find that firm value is reduced via industrial diversification and this reduction in value depends upon a firm’s technology intensity. We consider that asymmetric information problems are more severe in technology intensive industries and find that high tech industry firms present distinctly larger value reduction when compared to low tech industry firms. The negative valuation effect is greater for firms that have a relatively larger amount of intangible assets and greater R&D capital. We determine that our findings are robust to different estimation methods and alternative excess value measures.     

Big Six auditors and audit quality: The Korean evidence

This study investigates the association between discretionary accruals and Big Six and non-Big Six auditors, and the direction of auditor change. We hypothesize that there is no significant difference in discretionary accruals between Big Six and non-Big Six clients when there is low incentive for auditors to provide high-quality audits, as in Korea.Upon examination of the discretionary accruals of firms listed on the Korean Stock Exchange from 1994 to 1998, we find there is no significant difference between the discretionary accruals of firms with Big Six and non-Big Six auditors. This holds true for firms that switch from non-Big Six to Big Six auditors and vice versa. These resources imply that there may be no difference in audit quality between Big Six and non-Big Six auditors in Korea. This is consistent with other studies in Korea, while inconsistent with the findings of previous studies on audit quality in other countries.     

Audit firm size, public ownership, and firms' discretionary accruals management

In this study, we developed and tested three hypotheses concerning earnings management in Belgium (i.e., a continental European environment). The three hypotheses are about: (1) income smoothing, (2) Bix Six auditors, and (3) public ownership. The study is motivated by the finding by Becker, DeFond, Jiambalvo, & Subramanyam [Contemp. Account. Res. 15 (1998) 1] and Francis, Maydew, & Sparks [Audit. J. Pract. Theory 18 (1999) 17] that Big Six audit firms act as a constraint on both income-increasing and income-decreasing earnings management. The finding raises questions as to the determinants of earnings management in other institutional settings such as that of Belgium. Accordingly, we study publicly available financial statements of a matched sample of publicly and privately held Belgian firms. Following Francis et al. [Audit. J. Pract. Theory 18 (1999) 17], DeFond and Subramanyam [J. Account. Econ. 25 (1998) 35], and Becker et al. [Contemp. Account. Res. 15 (1998) 1], we use discretionary accruals as a measure of earnings management. We find that Belgian companies—both private and public—engage in income smoothing and manage earnings opportunistically to meet the benchmark target of prior-year earnings. The evidence is also supportive of the other two hypotheses, but only when companies have earnings that are above target and have incentives to smooth earnings downwards. The fact that our results on the impact of Big Six auditors and ownership type are different for above and below target firms in Belgium, and differ with findings on U.S. samples, can be explained by the Belgian institutional environment.     

Was audit quality of Laventhol and Horwath poor?

Laventhol and Horwath (L&H), the then seventh largest accounting firm in the US, declared bankruptcy in November 1990. The firm claimed that its bankruptcy was due to the perception of it being a deep pocket rather than inherent deficiencies in its performance. In this study, we examine whether the audit quality of L&H was lower than other auditors. Results do not show that L&H is associated with lower quality audits either in terms of lower likelihood of issuing modified audit opinion, higher levels of discretionary accruals for its clients, or lower predictability of discretionary accruals for future non-discretionary net income for its clients than for clients of other auditors. Results of additional tests also do not suggest that auditors that take up clients of L&H report differently from L&H. This evidence does not support the proposition that L&H’s audit quality was less than audit quality of other audit firms during the period leading up to the bankruptcy.     

Impact of family dominance on monitoring of earnings management by audit committees: Evidence from Hong Kong

This study examines whether the establishment of audit committees by Hong Kong firms would constrain earnings management, especially in firms with family-dominated corporate boards, a condition unique to Hong Kong. The study uses the methodology of three-stage (3SLS) regression analyses to control for endogeneity among earnings management, voluntarily established audit committee, and corporate board size. The results of regression analyses based on 523 observations for the period of 1999-2000 when the audit committees were first established by Hong Kong firms show that overall audit committees play a significant role in constraining earnings management even in the business environment of higher ownership concentration. The effectiveness of audit committees is, however, significantly reduced when family members are present on corporate boards, especially when family members dominate the corporate board.     

Audit opinion and earnings management: Evidence from Greece

This study examines the relationship between audit opinions and earnings management, as measured by discretionary accruals, for listed firms on the Athens Stock Exchange (ASE). We divide the qualified audit opinions into two categories: qualified for the going-concern uncertainty and qualified for other reasons. The results indicate that audit opinions are not related to earnings management. Client financial characteristics, such as profitability and size are determinants of the going-concern audit opinion decision. The decision of auditors to issue qualified opinions for other reasons is explained by the type of audit opinion issued in the previous year.     

Public and private sector auditors and accruals quality in English NHS hospital Trusts

To promote auditor independence and audit quality in English NHS Trusts the Audit Commission regulates auditor rotation, fees and the appointment of its own and private sector auditors. NHS sanctioned departures from GAAP, some of which allow the financial breakeven target to be achieved, have been criticised by the Audit Commission as detrimental to financial discipline. In this paper, we investigate the association between abnormal accruals and the achievement of financial breakeven in NHS hospital Trusts over the period 1998–2005. We also investigate the association between abnormal accruals, audit fees and the Trusts audited by public and private sector auditors. We find evidence that abnormal accruals are used to achieve financial breakeven and they differ across different types of auditor. We also identify a negative relationship between abnormal accruals and NHS Trust star ratings. These findings raise questions about the ‘quality’ of NHS audit where compliance with NHS-specific regulations overrides the wider GAAP-based requirement for financial statements to show a true and fair view and they warrant reconsideration of the nature of audit in NHS Trusts.