We examine the impact of a change in the audit industry structure in China as a result of two recent mergers involving large non-Big 4 audit firms. The ‘New Big’ audit firms, Ruihua and BDO Lixin, became the third and fourth largest audit firms in China following audit firm mergers,...

In this paper, I study whether labor supply shocks affect firm mergers and acquisitions (M&A). Focusing on the audit market setting and using a novel dataset that includes both large and small audit firms, I identify labor supply shocks using the 150-Hour Rule and the Mobility Provision and...