Recent studies indicate dividends are associated with higher quality earnings. Our study extends the literature by examining whether dividends' information is associated with auditors' assessment of their clients' earnings quality. Our results show that auditors charge lower fees to...

In this archival study we report three main findings related to auditability of pension accounting estimates. 1. The financial note disclosures of ranges of estimated returns are miscalibrated and provide low credibility of including either the actual or expected returns. 2. The estimated...

This paper examines the association between auditor's independence and financial analysts' forecast revisions in the specific case of goodwill impairment testing. Using a sample of 1,247 firm-year observations representing 177 firms listed on the CAC All-Tradable (the former SBF 250) over the...

This paper investigates whether the differences in audit quality between Big 4 and non-Big 4 auditors can be attributed to the client’s pre-audit financial reporting quality or to the differences in audit treatment via audit adjustments. Hand-collected pre-audit and audited financial statement...

Utilizing the Finnish setting, this paper examines the association between industry specialization of an individual audit partner and the quality of earnings reported for privately-held companies. Rules in Finland require that the name(s) of the audit engagement partner(s) appear in audit...

This paper aims to provide an analysis of the profitability of audit firms in the Republic of Serbia during the period 2016-2018. The analysis is based on the data collected from the financial statements from all audit firms registered in the Republic of Serbia. The profitability analysis...

We examine determinants of audit engagement profitability using proprietary data from the national office of a Big 4 public accounting firm in Canada. We verify through interviews with senior audit partners that the audit realization rate is the primary measure used to assess engagement level...

In this study, we consider how changing expectations of earnings affect a dishonest manager's strategy to overstate earnings and an auditor's strategy to exert effort in a two-period setting. We model the manager type as either honest or dishonest, which allows us to differentiate audit risk...

I argue that external financial reporting quality has at best a 2nd order effect on firm value of U.S. publicly traded companies and that attempts to improve a firm's external reporting quality has a 3rd order effect on these firms' value. Recognizing that external financial reporting quality is...

Under the assumption that audit quality relates positively to unobservable financial reporting reliability, we investigate whether audit quality is associated with the predictability of accounting earnings by focusing on analyst earnings forecast properties. The evidence shows that analysts'...