In this paper we argue that audit firms rationally consider the potential reactions of their rivals when deciding how … [1990]), we hypothesize that competing with the same audit firms across different industries within a geographical region … rivals. As we characterize the audit market as a differentiated Bertrand oligopoly, pricing is a main strategic choice …

Using a proprietary dataset consisting of all private firm audit engagements in 2000 from one Big 4 firm in Belgium, we … investigate: (1) whether audit office industry scale is associated with a reduction of total, partner and staff audit hours and … the extent of efficiency pass-on from the auditor to its clients depends on the audit firm's market power. We find that …

Competition in audit markets is an important topic but direct tests of market competition have been limited. In this … paper, we examine how audit firms behave when they are confronted with competition from another firm in a wide range of … industry segments in a local market. Sharing a large number of market segments can lead to mutual forbearance among audit …

Recent studies have documented that auditor industry specialization is associated with higher audit fees for public … firms in Australia, the U.S. and the U.K. This paper uses a unique dataset that consists of all audit engagements for the … premium for industry specialization. Above that, specialization leads to higher audit fees for both Big 4 specialists and non …