投资银行-审计师业务关联与IPO盈余管理

近年来国内外审计研究倍加重视在审计师个人层面展开研究,而这在我国关系型社会的背景下尤显重要.审计师与金融中介机构存在诸多利益联结,但已有研究鲜有涉及这一经济利益关系如何影响注册会计师行为.我们研究IPO过程中投资银行与审计师由重复合作形成的业务关联并发现,投资银行-审计师在签字注册会计师个人层面的业务关联提高了IPO正向盈余管理水平,而投资银行-审计师在会计师事务所层面的关联则不会提高甚至降低了IPO正向盈余管理水平;上述结果在投资银行风险控制评级较低、审计师规模较小、审计任期较短以及客户业务较为复杂时更为明显.同时,投资银行与会计师的业务关联既能够提高投资银行的收费,也能够提高审计收费,表明为了获得更多的收费可能是注册会计师与投资银行进行合谋而配合IPO盈余管理的重要原因.     

国有股权与公司IPO中的审计师选择行为及动机

审计师选择是审计研究的核心问题。本文首次研究了国有股权在中国A股IPO市场对审计师选择的影响及其具体机制。我们发现,国有股比例越高,公司选择高质量的审计师的概率越低;当国有股权比例较低时,高质量的审计师能够降低IPO发行抑价,但是,国有股比例的提高会损害高质量审计师降低IPO抑价的作用,并且,国有股比例越高,IPO抑价越高。这说明国有股权对IPO中的审计师选择的影响既不是因为国有股比例的提高容易导致公司与低质量的审计师合谋,也不是因为国有股权可以代替高质量的审计师在降低IPO融资成本过程中的作用,而是因为国有股权会损害高质量审计师声誉机制的发挥,进而损害了其在降低IPO融资成本过程中的作用。本文对于丰富和深化我们关于中国A股市场审计师选择行为和审计师声誉机制作用发挥的认识,具有非常重要的作用。     

基于寻租视角的IPO公司审计师选择

IPO发行制度规定企业的财务报表必须经过会计师事务所的审计,而发审委中有审计师担任委员,所以审计师在IPO过程中可能具有双重身份,既是IPO公司雇佣的中介机构,又是IPO资格的审核者.那么IPO公司会不会利用审计师的这种双重身份,通过购买审计师的服务来协助其对发审委委员寻租,最终顺利通过IPO审核呢?本文基于寻租动机,研究具有什么特征的公司更倾向于选择有审计师在发审委中担任委员的事务所.本文的贡献在于从寻租的视角来提供经验支持,丰富了IPO公司审计师选择的研究.     

中国证券市场审计师声誉溢价与审计质量的经验研究

审计师在证券市场上被誉为公共利益的守护神。然而,由于证券市场上的利益相关各方无从直接识别审计报告的质量,因而审计市场便具有了“柠糠市场“的特征。当交易双方处在高度的信息不对称条件下时,声誉作为一种信号传递机制发挥着不可替代的作用。本文使用中国沪、深两市上市公司2000—2002年度年报审计费用数据,应用信号传递理论,研究了共2520个样本的审计师声誉溢价现象。研究发现:中国本地前五(四)大会计师事务所相对于本地其他所,其溢价幅度为7.57%;国际“五(四)大“会计公司在中国内地设立的国际合作所,相对于中国本地除前“五(四)大“以外的事务所而言,其声誉溢价的幅度更高,达到23.12%。研究结果表明,国际合作所、国内大、小会计师事务所之间在审计收费方面存在显著差异,即存在审计师声誉溢价现象。这说明审计师声誉作为审计质量的显示信号,已经得到市场的认同。本文的研究初步验证了中国证监会、财政部与中国注册会计师协会促使本地事务所合并、以便做大做强来提升本地会计师事务所声誉和市场竞争力的政策已经取得成效,中国本地会计师事务所的声誉机制正在形成。     

溢价审计费用:经济租金还是审计成本?

界定溢价审计费用是否包含经济租金以及厘清其成因,对于溢价审计费用的有效管制具有重要意义.研究发现,我国资本市场溢价审计费用同时包含经济租金和成本,大部分是审计师相对于小客户的市场优势地位带来的经济租金,小部分来自成本性的审计师声誉溢价,并且四大会计师事务所的声誉溢价显著高于国内其他大所.在排除规模经济性假说以及控制内生性问题之后,上述结果依然稳健.     

代理冲突、董事会质量与“污点”审计师变更

当审计师因受监管部门处罚而致声誉受损时,公司变更"污点"审计师表明其对高质量审计服务存在较大需求。本文利用2002-2010年间被中国证监会处罚的会计师事务所及其上市公司客户数据,从代理冲突和董事会质量的角度,考察相关因素对上市公司变更其声誉受损审计师决策的影响。结果发现,就代理冲突变量而言,当原审计师受到处罚后,股权集中度与审计师变更之间呈显著正向关系,而财务杠杆及管理层是否持股与审计师变更之间没有表现出显著的关系;就董事会质量而言,董事会的规模、独立性和勤勉性与"污点"审计师变更之间均未表现出显著关联,仅是否同时设立四个专门委员会与"污点"审计师变更之间呈显著正向关系。     

审计师声誉影响股票定价吗——来自IPO定价市场化的证据

本文以IPO定价市场化为背景,研究实施询价后的审计师声誉对IPO定价的影响。文章以"四大"和国内排名前十大的会计师事务所来衡量审计师声誉,采用多元回归和两阶段回归方法对假设进行检验,结果发现审计师声誉与公司询价水平正相关,但在统计上并不显著;在对抑价率的检验中,我们发现审计师声誉显著降低股票抑价率。进一步地,我们发现在民营上市公司中,上述关系更为稳健。总体来看,审计师声誉已经初步影响了股票定价。     

管理层持股与审计师事务所规模

本文假定大的审计师事务所所提供较高质量的审计服务.通过检验管理层持股比例和审计师事务所规模的关系,检验代理理论的预测.通过管理层持股比例和代理成本之间关系和会计事务所规模和审计质量的结合,代理理论预测代理成本和雇佣高质量的会计师事务所之间是正相关关系     

会计师事务所组织形式、盈余管理与IPO折价

会计师事务所组织形式由有限责任制变为特殊普通合伙制,增加了审计师的法律责任,提高了审计的鉴证价值和保险价值,有利于审计师在 IPO 审计过程中更好地发挥信息中介作用。以保荐制下 IPO公司为样本,实证考察事务所组织形式对 IPO 盈余管理和 IPO 折价的影响。研究发现,相比有限责任制事务所,特殊普通合伙制事务所审计的发行公司的正向盈余管理水平更低,IPO 折价率也更低。研究结论表明事务所转制后,审计师加强了对发行公司盈余管理行为的约束,提高了 IPO 定价效率,监管部门推动的事务所转制对 IPO 市场具有积极治理效果。     

审计师聘约权安排重要吗?——审计师声誉角度的检验

通过考察中国证监会1993-2004年度间所有涉及到审计师和事务所的处罚公告发布后,是否出现资本市场股票价格下降和事务所客户流失等经济后果。数据分析表明,当审计师受到处罚的事件公布后,市场存在一定程度的负反应;但是,只要这种处罚没有触及到审计师的执业资格,审计师的市场份额就没有下降。借助一个理论分析的框架,我们推测认为,当聘约权主要由公司管理层和/或控股股东掌控且他们的财富与审计师声誉没有直接关联度的情况下,审计师声誉下降并不必然具有经济后果。这一研究为更好地理解审计师声誉的形成机制以及审计师声誉与审计质量之间的关系,提供了新的证据。     

The impact of corporate governance on auditor choice: Evidence from China

As the largest and fastest growing emerging market, China is becoming more and more important to investors throughout the world. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the determinants of firms’ auditor choice in China in respect of their corporate governance mechanism. Normally firms have to take a trade-off in their auditor choice decisions, i.e., to hire high-quality auditors to signal effective audit monitoring and good corporate governance to lower their capital raising costs, or to select low-quality auditors with less effective audit monitoring in order to reap private benefits derived from weak corporate governance and less-transparent disclosure (the opaqueness gains). We develop a logit regression model to test the impact of firms’ internal corporate governance mechanism on auditor choice decisions made by IPO firms getting listed during a bear market period of 2001–2004 in China. Three variables are used to proxy for firms’ internal corporate governance mechanism, i.e., the ownership concentration, the size of the supervisory board (SB), and the duality of CEO and chairman of board of directors (BoDs). We classify all auditors in China into large auditors (Top 10) and others (non-Top 10), assuming the large auditors can provide higher quality audit services. The empirical results show that firms with larger controlling shareholders, with smaller size of SB, or in which CEO and BoDs chairman are the same person, are less likely to hire a Top 10 (high-quality) auditor. This suggests that when benefits from lowering capital raising costs are trivial, firms with weaker internal corporate governance mechanism are inclined to choose a low-quality auditor so as to capture and sustain their opaqueness gains. On the other hand, with improvement of corporate governance, firms should be more likely to appoint high-quality auditors.     

Audit quality, auditor compensation and initial public offering underpricing

We jointly study the impact of audit quality on auditor compensation and initial public offering (IPO) underpricing using a sample of Australian firms going public over the period 1996–2003. We find that quality (Big Four) audit firms earn significantly higher fees than non-Big Four auditors, and audit quality is positively associated with IPO underpricing. The positive relation between audit quality and underpricing is more pronounced for small issues, IPOs underwritten by non-prestigious underwriters, and those that are not backed by venture capitalists. Taken together, our results suggest that quality auditors serve as a signalling device that enhances post-issue market value of equity.     

Information uncertainty and auditor reputation

This paper explores the relationship between information uncertainty and auditor reputation revealed by the failure of Arthur Andersen (AA). AA’s reputation deteriorated considerably when it announced on January 10, 2002, that it had shredded documents related to its audit of Enron. AA’s demise was sealed on March 14, 2002, with its indictment for obstruction of justice. We find that on these dates the clients of AA and other Big Five auditors that are characterized by higher information uncertainty experience relatively larger share price declines compared to clients with lower information uncertainty. The findings suggest that the market relies more heavily on auditor reputation for higher information uncertainty firms, which implies that the value of an audit is greater when a firm is harder to value. Our results highlight the importance of information uncertainty in financial markets: where there is a shock to auditor reputation, firms with greater information uncertainty suffer the largest losses.     

FRC intervention,financial reporting quality and due diligence

This study provides evidence of the relationship between government intervention, financial reporting quality and due diligence. Specifically, the authors examine the consequences of the disclosure of inspection reports by the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) for individual audit firms inspected in the UK. Using a difference-in-differences design, it is found that clients are more likely to receive qualified audit opinions during the post-disclosure period. This significant impact on reporting decisions is more concentrated among clients of small audit firms. Moreover, despite general efficiency during the sample period, clients affected by an FRC intervention experience longer delays in receiving their audit reports. Overall, this study contributes to literature on corporate governance and audit regulation, and has implications for policy making. FRC inspections are of greater concern to small audit firms than large firms, as the latter have already built a strong reputation. In general, the transparent inspection process may be beneficial in enhancing auditor oversight.     

Taxing audit markets and reputation: An examination of the U.S. tax shelter controversy

From 2002 to 2007, the nation's largest CPA firms faced allegations of illegal activity related to the sale of tax shelters: EY, KPMG and PwC paid fines; KPMG was investigated by a federal grand jury; and EY faced a criminal inquiry. These shelter events occurred shortly after the 2002 collapse of Arthur Andersen, when policy makers were concerned about audit market concentration. This is the first paper to provide a chronological summary of how the tax shelter controversy started and ended. We investigate the stock market reaction to tax shelter news developments between 2003 and 2005 to make inferences about the market's view of audit competition and CPA firm reputation. Our results are consistent with market concern over large audit firm concentration, evidenced by large negative returns for clients of all audit providers upon the KPMG grand jury investigation announcement. We also find that tax shelter activities impact both the reputation of the accounting profession and the individual CPA firms marketing tax shelter products.     

Do Expert Informational Intermediaries Add Value? Evidence from Auditors in Microcap Initial Public Offerings

Do expert informational intermediaries add value? We address this question by examining the informativeness of the audit report contained in the prospectus associated with a firm's initial public offering (IPO). At the time of the IPO, there is a relative lack of information to facilitate the establishment of equity values, suggesting that the information provided by outside “experts” (e.g., auditors, underwriters) is particularly important. In this article we study small, non‐venture‐backed IPOs, a segment of the market with the poorest long‐run performance and where the prestigious audit firm is often the sole (if any) expert present. We find that the pre‐IPO opinions of larger auditors are more predictive of post‐IPO negative stock delistings. Of particular note, the opinions of the national‐tiered firms are comparably predictive to those of the Big 6, though this finding emerges only after we consider the selectivity‐based differences in the clients that hire these national firms. Our findings also indicate that, for larger auditors the presence of a pre‐IPO going‐concern opinion is more strongly associated with first‐year stock returns and that larger auditors are more likely to give such opinions to their distressed clients. Overall, we address a deficiency in the literature relating to “the paucity of evidence on the value of auditor opinions to investors” (Healy and Palepu [ 2001 p. 415]).     

How individual auditor characteristics impact the likelihood of audit failure: Evidence from China

Audit failure imposes a severe loss on investors and damages market participants' confidence in financial reporting quality. This study investigates the impacts of individual auditor characteristics on the likelihood of audit failure. Chinese regulators mandate listed firms to disclose the engagement auditors' identity. Furthermore, the information regarding individual auditor characteristics in China is also publicly available. Utilizing this unique setting, we examine the relationship between individual auditor characteristics and the likelihood of audit failure in China during the period from 2000 to 2009. We document that individual auditors with more auditing experience are less likely associated with audit failure. We also find a weaker negative relationship between auditor education level and audit failure. Our study has important implications for both auditors and regulators by shedding lights on the determinants of audit failure and by providing guidance to the human resource management in audit firms.     

Auditor sanction and reputation damage: Evidence from changes in non-client-company directorships

This study examines whether audit partners who have also served on the boards of directors of companies other than the audit firms' clients lose their directorships after they are sanctioned. Using 2002–2015 Taiwanese samples, the empirical results at the company level show that sanctioned audit partners, particularly those with a serious sanction, are less likely to gain or retain their directorships than the non-sanctioned ones following sanctions. Moreover, the results at the individual level show that, among the audit partners already serving as directors, those who have a serious sanction hold fewer directorships and are more likely to exit the director market than the non-sanctioned ones. Among the audit partners not yet holding director positions, those who have been sanctioned, regardless of the sanction severity, are less likely to enter the director market than the non-sanctioned ones. These contrasting results suggest asymmetric reputation penalties for existing partner directors and potential partner directors following auditor sanctions. Overall, sanctions damage auditors’ reputation capital, and the adverse consequences spill over into the director market.     

On investment banker monitoring in the new issues market

This article primarily addresses two largely unanswered questions in the financial economics literature: (i) is there a demand for lead bank monitoring in the initial public offering (IPO) market?, and (ii) does monitoring by the lead investment banker lead to better post-issue performance? We find evidence consistent with the demand for underwriter monitoring in the IPO market. We examine variables which proxy for the incentives of lead underwriters to supply monitoring post-issue. These variables include lead investment bank reputation and whether warrants are issued to the underwriter by the issuing firm. We find that lead bank reputation is positively associated with the post-issue performance of IPO firms. We also examine whether additional value added monitoring is provided by unaffiliated analysts. The number of unaffiliated analysts following is positively correlated with post-issue performance. Our results are consistent with third party monitoring in the new issues market.     

UNDERWRITER REPUTATION AND REPETITIVE PUBLIC OFFERINGS

A recent examination of underwriter reputation and initial public offerings (IPOs) suggests that one of the reasons prestigious underwriters market low-risk IPOs is to increase the expected present value of subsequent offerings. There is a greater likelihood that a firm issuing low-risk IPOs will be a viable future operation with the potential for subsequent offerings than a firm issuing high-risk IPOs. I examine the hypothesis that the likelihood of subsequent offerings is negatively related to IPO risk. In addition to finding support for this hypothesis, I show that the likelihood of subsequent offerings is positively related to the IPO underwriter's reputation and negatively related to the IPO gross spread. Finally, I find that the likelihood of firms switching IPO underwriters for subsequent offerings decreases with increasing IPO underwriter reputation.