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Gold Et Al. (2012)
Gold Et Al. (2012)
Anna Gold*
VU University Amsterdam
anna.gold@vu.nl
Friederike Molls
Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster
friederike.molls@wiwi.uni-muenster.de
Christiane Pott
Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster
christiane.pott@wiwi.uni-muenster.de
Christoph Watrin
Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster
christoph.watrin@wiwi.uni-muenster.de
Abstract:
This study contributes to the recent debate over the effect of audit partner tenure
investigate the effect of partner tenure and rotation on audit quality, using unique
1995-2010 data from all German listed companies for which we identify not only
the audit engagement but also the quality review partner. Using multiple absolute
and signed values earnings management measures as proxies for audit quality, we
partner tenure (but not engagement partner tenure). Further, rotation of the review
partner (but not the engagement partner) is associated with more income-reducing
the two partner roles and support the expertise hypothesis with respect to the
review partner.
The harsh criticism of the auditing profession in the wake of corporate scandals
1996) is the possibility of an excessive tenure period for audit partners, the
and reporting practices because of familiarity threats and/or in order to retain the
Mautz and Sharaf 1961; AICPA 1978; DeAngelo 1981a; SEC 1994; IFAC 2008).
now requires rotation of both the audit engagement and review partner every five
rotation of both engagement and review partners for audit reports dated after June
2008.1 The major expected benefit is that rotation will improve audit quality
because inappropriate accounting practices are more likely identified when a new,
and hence more independent, engagement partner assumes responsibility for the
1
Member states are given discretion with regard to the exact rotation period.
2
requirement suggest a number of potential pitfalls that may counter the benefits.
Aside from the additional costs incurred to audit firms, a new partner may lack
which could potentially lead to lower audit quality—an argument known as the
expertise hypothesis (e.g., Solomon et al. 1999; Johnson et al. 2002). Therefore,
despite the widely adopted requirement of audit partner rotation, the standard‘s
consequences remain unclear and could be either beneficial or harmful for the
States have examined tenure and rotation at the within-firm partner level by
observing signature changes on audit reports. With few exceptions (i.e., Chen et
al. 2008), results of these studies suggest that (excessive) tenure adversely affects
audit quality (Chi and Huang 2005; Carey and Simnett 2006; Manry et al. 2008)
and that audit quality is higher for firms under a mandatory partner rotation
regime than for firms not subject to rotation (Chi et al. 2009). Hence, these studies
the engagement partner, relevant standards clearly require rotation of all key
partners, hence including the quality review partner (hereafter called ‗review
3
quality control for audit engagements and to serve as an evaluation of the
performance of the audit engagement partner and team (Epps and Messier 2007).
As such, the review partner plays a vital role in the audit review process and for
the attainment of a high quality audit; however, no prior research has examined
either tenure or rotation effects with respect to the review partner separately. In
Germany, both partners‘ signatures must be visible and identifiable in the audit
report and both partners are formally responsible for the audit (§ 322 HGB of the
principle common in German business law. As such, German audit report data
offers the unique opportunity to examine tenure and rotation of the review partner
engagement partner has largely been shown to aggravate audit quality and there is
dynamics might be significantly different when considering the role of the review
partner. More specifically the review partner might be relatively less susceptible
the client is less extensive and frequent due to the review partner‘s primary role of
quality control. Further, it is possible that the review partner would primarily
benefit from tenure and that rotation might reduce audit quality, because the
accumulated experience with the client is not always transferred to a new review
4
partner. While refraining from formulating directional hypotheses in this regard,
Consistent with prior studies (e.g., Chi et al. 2009), we examine these
proxies for audit quality. We identify a sample of 2,636 firm-year observations for
rotation was legally mandated from 2002 onwards.2 Descriptive results reveal that
in the German mandatory rotation setting, rotation occurs even more frequently
than the standard requires, such that the mean of partner tenure is less than three
years, and the great majority of German firms implement rotation of the review
partner (98.56%) and audit engagement partner (99.81%) before the seventh year
of tenure. Our regression results suggest that tenure of the review partner is
our paper provides evidence in favor of the expertise hypothesis, but only for the
review partner.
2
The standard was introduced retro-actively; meaning that engagement and review partners
starting in 1995 or earlier were forced to rotate ultimately by 2002.
5
Our study contributes to the debate on mandatory auditor rotation in at
least two respects. First, in an extension of Chi and Huang (2005), Carey and
Simnett (2006), Chen et al. (2008), and Manry et al. (2008), our analysis provides
new empirical evidence by using financial reports on partner (and firm) level
rotation and tenure data in a highly developed audit environment, i.e., Germany.
Second and more importantly, our unique distinction between engagement partner
we believe study results are interesting for policy makers and regulators in
recent key policy initiatives in the areas of audit partner rotation and the role of
research design, sections 4 and 5 report the empirical results, and section 6
6
2. Recent key policy initiatives, literature review and hypotheses
Audit partner rotation is required in many countries, but the maximum tenure
allowed varies considerably. In the 1970s, the United States was the first
legislation to require rotation of the audit partner after seven years of tenure on
rotation period was further reduced to five years for public company engagements
and now includes the rotation of both the engagement partner and the review
partner. Similarly, the Department of Trade and Industry and the U.K. Treasury
after five years and of other key engagement partners after seven years. By the
end of June 2008, all member states of the European Union were required to enact
the revised 8th Directive‘s requirements into national law (European Commission
2006). One important detail of the Directive is rotation of the key audit partner,3
but member states are given discretion regarding the maximum tenure allowed.
Even before the EU Directive was issued, Germany had revised its
3
The key audit partner is typically the partner that signs the audit report, but may also denote
either (a) the statutory auditor(s) designated by an audit firm for a particular audit engagement as
being primarily responsible for carrying out the statutory audit on behalf of the audit firm; or (b) in
the case of a group audit, at least the statutory auditor(s) designated by an audit firm as being
primarily responsible for carrying out the statutory audit at the level of the group and the statutory
auditor(s) designated as being primarily responsible at the level of material subsidiaries.
7
becoming effective in 2002. As a result, an audit partner was forced to rotate from
the engagement if he/she had signed the audit report six times during a ten-year
2002) (Veltins 2004).4 Next, we discuss prior research and develop hypotheses
regarding the potential effects of engagement partner tenure and rotation on audit
quality.
Audit quality is defined as the joint probability that an auditor will both detect and
independence). Prior literature and theory explain how the length of the
relationship between the auditor and the client (i.e., tenure) may affect audit
4
As part of this major reform, § 319a HGB was issued for public interest companies. This
legislation defines circumstances under which an auditor must immediately be excluded from the
audit. Beyond the reasons stated in § 319 II and III HGB, an auditor is also excluded from the
audit of a client using an organized market, as defined in § 2 V Securities Trading Act4
(Wertpapierhandelsgesetz), if the key audit partner(s) has issued (i.e. signed) the audit opinion
(Bestätigungsvermerk–§ 322 HGB) for seven or more consecutive years (§ 319a I no. 4). This
requirement is waived if there has been a cooling-off period of three or more years since the last
audit.
8
reflected by the hypotheses of independence and expertise (e.g., Mautz and Sharaf
to auditor independence (IFAC 2008). The IFAC Code of Ethics states that a
team becomes too sympathetic to the client‘s interests‖ (IFAC 2008, p. 18). This
threat could result in a decline in the audit partner‘s ability to accurately judge the
explanation is the threat of routine. While an audit partner will likely apply
Hoyle 1978; McLaren 1958), deeper knowledge over time about the client‘s
systems and control procedures may result in more routine audit programs (Hoyle
1978). Shockley (1981, p. 789) asserts that ―complacency, lack of innovation, less
rigorous audit procedures and a developed confidence in the client may arise after
a long association with the client.‖ The major concern is that prior year audits
may cause the partner to anticipate current results instead of carefully and
9
predicts that auditor tenure is negatively associated with audit quality, while
al. 2002) contends that audit quality may increase with auditor tenure because the
auditor gains more knowledge of the client and the client‘s industry over time.
This explanation is based on information asymmetry between the client and the
auditor, which decreases over time, as the auditor acquires client- and industry-
lack of this knowledge in the early years of an audit engagement may result in a
lower quality audit, while tenure should have a favorable effect on audit quality
(Beck et al. 1988; Hoyle 1978; Knapp 1991; Solomon et al. 1999; Geiger and
auditor tenure/rotation and audit quality at the audit partner level, most prior
research has examined this relationship at the audit firm level. Archival evidence
on audit firm tenure shows mixed results as to which theory dominates with
respect to audit quality – the independence hypothesis (e.g., Kealey et al. 2007;
Mansi et al. 2004; Stanley and DeZoort 2007) or the expertise hypothesis (e.g.,
Carcello and Nagy 2004; Davis et al. 2009; DeFond and Subramanyam 1998;
10
Ghosh and Moon 2005; Johnson et al. 2002). However, Bamber and Bamber
(2009) caution that findings based on audit firm rotation may not be generalizable
Recent archival research has considered the issue of rotation and tenure at
the engagement partner level and provides mixed results. The mandatory
Australia and Taiwan, has enabled such endeavors. Carey and Simnett (2006)
conducted one of the first studies in this area by examining Australian listed
audit quality used. The non-Big 6 (but not Big 6) auditors‘ propensity to issue
going-concern audit opinions for distressed companies was less likely as audit
association between audit partner tenure and either the signed or absolute amount
of abnormal working capital accruals. Using Taiwanese data, Chi and Huang
(2005) found that engagement partner (and audit firm) tenure initially led to
higher earnings quality (particularly for Big 5 auditors), but excessive familiarity
with the client (i.e., more than five years) negatively affected earnings quality.
Again using a sample of Taiwanese companies, Chen et al. (2008) found that the
audit partner tenure, hence leading to an increase in audit quality. Chi et al. (2009)
investigated the effects on audit quality of the mandatory audit partner rotation
11
implemented in Taiwan in 2004. Using absolute and signed abnormal accruals
and abnormal working capital accruals as proxies for audit quality, they found
that in 2004, audit quality was higher for companies subject to the mandatory
rotation regime than for firms not subject to rotation. Finally, the only United
States study on audit partner tenure to date (Manry et al. 2008) found that partner
tenure was positively associated with audit quality, using estimated discretionary
accruals as a proxy. Excessive tenure (i.e., more than seven years) again had
issue biased audit reports (Dopuch et al. 2001) and strengthens independence in
that partner rotation may have favorable effects on audit quality. However, while
audit firm rotation evoked higher confidence in financial statements by MBA and
law students, partner rotation did not have this effect (Gates et al. 2007).
confirm the expertise hypothesis. Some studies even fail to find an effect of
tenure/rotation on audit quality, which could indicate that the two explanations
12
these relationships in the German setting, which uniquely allows us to isolate
quality.
quality.
Next, we consider how tenure and rotation of the review partner may affect audit
quality.
performance of the engagement partner and the engagement team (Epps and
Messier 2007). The potential strengths of the review partner are manifold. First,
possibly favorable attitudes toward the client and potential reluctance in the final
review stage to challenge or question decisions made in earlier stages), the review
partner has significantly less interaction with the client, which may reduce such
familiarity threats in the first place (Schneider et al. 2003). Second, review
partners typically hold little accountability toward the client but have considerable
knowledge about the client‘s industry; therefore, they offer an opportunity for
objective and high-level judgments and decisions (Matsumura and Tucker 1995;
13
Rich et al. 1997). According to German audit standards, the review partner‘s
the audit opinion, the structure of the audit, and its material aspects. Furthermore,
review partner who is not involved in planning and conducting the audit is
consists of evaluating whether the audit procedures and audit results are
engagement partner and the review partner are formally responsible for the audit
and the reasonableness of the audit opinion, and both partners‘ signatures must be
visible and identifiable in the audit reports (§ 322 HGB of the German
accept the role as key audit partners with the consequence of having to rotate after
seven years of tenure with the audit client. Relevant to our study, it is common
dual control practice in Germany that the review partner‘s signature is located on
5
Although the 8th EU directive requires only the signature of one audit partner responsible for the
audit, it is German audit practice to provide the signature of the review partner in addition.
Providing both signatures in the audit report is a characteristic of the dual control principle
common in German business law. For instance, legislation mandates company representation by at
least two directors (§ 709 Abs. 1 BGB und § 35 Abs. 2 Satz 1 GmbHG, § 77 Abs. 1 Satz 1 AktG)
and dual quality control of audit firms (§ 24d Abs. 1 Satz 1 BS WP/vBP).
14
the lower left-hand side of the audit report, next to the right-hand side signature of
review partner have reached partner level and typically work for the same audit
firm. 7 The review partner‘s signature implies that the signer is sufficiently
familiar with the audit to be able to take co-responsibility for the audit opinion.
studies to date have examined audit review partner effectiveness with respect to
audit quality. In an experiment, Kraut and Davidson (1998) found that review
neither client importance nor the importance of the client‘s industry, thus
6
To verify this signature practice for our study, we elicited survey responses of more than half of
the audit firms in our sample. The results clearly support that the signature on the left-hand side of
the audit report always identifies the person who conducted the quality review. Furthermore, to
support the survey results, we received the internal directives on quality assurance detailing the in-
house practice of three of the Big 4 audit firms. The directive explicitly states that the partner
providing the audit quality review signs the left-hand side of the audit report and the audit
engagement partner signs the right-hand side of the report. Thus, we can safely conclude that the
location of the signature in the audit report informs us of the role that an individual served during
the audit process (Gelhausen 2007).
7
As explained in more detail in our results section, we observe 24 joint audits in our sample
suggesting that two firms jointly conducted the audit and therefore a total of four partners (two
engagement partners and two review partners) sign the audit report (i.e., four signatures).
Controlling for joint audit cases in our regression models does not change our results.
15
the presence of a review partner and found that engagement partners planned
higher levels of audit testing (Matsumura and Tucker 1995) and exhibited less
reporting bias (Tucker and Matsumura 1997) in the presence of a review partner.
strategic behavior in their reporting. Similarly, Ayers and Kaplan (2003) found
that engagement partners performed better audit risk assessments during client
(2005) results revealed that continuing review partners (i.e., those with prior
involvement in the previous year‘s engagement) were less likely than new review
partners (i.e., no prior involvement) to reach conclusions that differed from the
engagement partner when the evidence refuted the engagement partner‘s view.
This finding may suggest that not even review partners are immune to potential
partner involvement in audit planning and found that the degree of a review
prior involvement; hence, this finding suggests that review partners have the
16
On one hand, we suggest that the likelihood of independence threats due to
tenure could be significantly lower for review partners than for engagement
partners. Review partners remain at a greater distance from the client and are less
involved in daily audit practices. Given such circumstances, they are in a unique
position to enjoy the learning benefits without risking the accompanying and
could more likely be at stake for review partners as compared to the independence
and Emby (2005), even review partners appear to be susceptible to bias in their
posit two null hypotheses to empirically test the association between review
partner tenure and audit quality, and review partner rotation and audit quality,
respectively:
quality.
quality.
3. Research design
Sample
Our data were obtained from two different sources. First, the accruals data were
obtained from the Compustat Global Industrial database. As shown in Table 1, the
17
initial sample consisted of 9,597 firm-year observations of German listed
items.
The data on audit firm, audit engagement, and review partner signatures
collected data from all German-listed companies for which annual financial
statements including the auditor‘s report were available. Our final sample consists
Empirical model
research commonly assesses perceptions of audit quality (for a review, see Quick
2004). Proxies for audit quality in archival research include materiality judgments
(e.g., Kemp et al. 1983), propensity to issue unqualified audit opinions (e.g.,
Vanstraelen 2000) and audit firm litigations (e.g., Latham et al. 1998). More
recent studies have used a firm‘s accrual accounting behavior as a proxy for audit
quality (e.g., Myers et al. 2003, Chi et al. 2005, Carey and Simnett 2006; Francis
and Wang 2008; Cameran et al. 2008). Lower accrual levels are associated with
18
greater auditor conservatism and are interpreted as indicating higher quality
and Myers et al. (2003) use the Jones 1991 model-estimated abnormal accruals as
proxies for audit quality. Consistent with Chi et al. (2009), we use the modified
Assuming that the total accruals of a firm can be divided into discretionary
(1)
Where
8
We are aware of the limitations of using balance sheet data to partition net income into accruals
and operating flows (Collins and Hribar 2002). However, in accordance with prior research using
international data (e.g., Leuz, Nanda and Wysocki 2003) we use the indirect approach to compute
total accruals, due to the lack of cash flow data for international firms in the commonly used
databases.
19
= Change in cash of firm i from year t to year t-1
Our measure is a modification of the original Jones model (Jones 1991), that is,
we use the cash flow Jones model (Kasznik 1999). These models are both based
estimation period, which is not (or at least less) affected by earnings management.
The coefficients resulting from this regression are used to estimate the total
accruals of the firms in the actual sample period. Comparing the results from this
regression to the expected total accruals calculated by the model (equation (1))
for industry-specific effects on the accruals, the model is calibrated separately for
each industry sector. The original Jones model (Jones 1991) is based on the idea
The original Jones model is modified in multiple ways. The model implies
that changes in revenues are non-discretionary. Dechow et al. (1995) modified the
20
Jones model by reducing the revenues by the receivables as receivables could
increase current assets if they include bad debt. Kasznik (1999) included a change
in the cash flow. This model assumes that the accruals of a current period are
dependent on the cash flows of the previous period. Therefore the coefficients of
the cash flow Jones model (Kasznik 1999) are estimated for each industry sector
(2)
Where
All variables are scaled by total assets to control for size effects and to reduce the
21
(3)
Where
To test hypotheses H1b and H2b, we examine the impact of audit engagement
(4)
Where
22
in absolute, positive and negative values
= dummy variable equal to ―1‖ if the audit
engagement partner was switched from t-1 to t, and
equal to ―0‖ otherwise
= dummy variable equal to ―1‖ if the audit review
partner was switched from t-1 to t, and equal to ―0‖
otherwise
= tenure of the engaged audit firm
= dummy variable equal to ―1‖ if the auditor is a Big 4
audit firm, and equal to ―0‖ otherwise
= sales growth rate calculated as the sales in year t
minus sales in t-1 and scaled by sales in year t-1
= natural logarithm of total sales
= cash flow in year t scaled by total assets in year t-1
= ratio of retained earnings to total common equity
Consistent with prior studies (Cameran et al. 2008; Chi et al. 2009), we use the
exact value, the absolute value, and the signed values of accruals as dependent
variables for our measures. To control for industry-specific effects, we use one-
digit codes from the North American Industry Classification system (NAICS). We
accruals in our model (l) (e.g., Chen et al. 2008; Chi et al. 2009; Myers et al.
2003). First, we include audit firm tenure in our models to control for any effect
on audit quality from the number of years that a given audit firm has been
performing the audit. Moreover, since accrual models are often unable to
accruals (Dechow et al. 1995; Kothari et al. 2005), we include cash flow to
23
our accrual model. We include lifecycle to control for changes in accruals over a
company‘s life cycle (Anthony and Ramesh 1992; Dechow et al. 2001).
in the sense that larger companies face higher political costs (Watts and
Zimmerman 1983; 1986; 1990) and higher litigation risk (Lang and Lundholm
1993). In addition, larger companies tend to report larger and more stable accruals
(Dechow and Dichev 2002). The growth of a company‘s sales is likely to increase
the absolute value of accruals. Finally, we control for Big4 audit firms, which tend
to be more conservative and to limit their clients‘ extreme accruals more than
non-Big 4 firms. However, findings related to this argument are mixed (Myers et
al. 2003).10
4. Results
Descriptive results
Panel A of Table 2 shows the distribution of audit engagement and review partner
switches over the entire sample period and other descriptive details on the joint
partner) switches occurred during our sample period, compared with 1.878
10
Results remain unchanged when we include leverage calculated as total liabilities/equity in all
our models. However, since our sample size decreases to 2,367 we refrain from the inclusion of
leverage in our main tests.
24
(1.949) observations during which no partner switch took place. Thus, we find
observations. In 124 cases of the 758 engagement partner switches (about five
percent), the engagement partner became review partner. Out of 687 review
partner.11 Further, rotation at the audit firm level occurred for 228 audit
engagements, constituting about nine percent of all audits in the sample. In 189
cases (about seven percent) the engagement partner rotated simultaneously with
the audit firm. The review partner rotated with the audit firm in 199 (about eight
tenure and review partner tenure for the full sample as well as for the five
exchange, i.e. DAX30, MDAX, TecDAX, SDAX and CDAX. The average audit
firm tenure is 5.23 years. The engagement partner rotates on average after a
period of 2.55 years, whereas the average review partner tenure is slightly longer
with 2.80 years.14,15 We find similar mean values for the subsample of firms listed
11
We provide additional tests related to the rotation from one the other audit partner role in the
sensitivity analysis section.
12
We provide additional tests related to the simultaneous rotation in the sensitivity analysis
section.
13
Since we do not know for how long switching audit firms audited a given company before 1995,
the descriptive details cannot be interpreted as the real-world mean of audit firm tenure.
14
Audit partner tenure is relatively short in Germany, which might be explained by the so-called
high-reputation mandates. Audit firms in Germany strive to improve individual partner profiles by
25
in the TecDAX, SDAX and CDAX; however, for the DAX30 (MDAX)
subsamples mean values are notably higher with 7.76 (6.04) years of average firm
tenure, 3.36 (2.78) years of average engagement partner tenure and 3.30 (3.04)
Panel C of Table 2 shows the mean, median, and standard deviation for the
exact, absolute, positive, and negative values of the cash flow Jones discretionary
accruals. As shown, the exact value of our accruals measure is positive, which
overall sample into firms with increasing and decreasing discretionary accruals
26
overall dominance of either income-increasing or income-decreasing earnings
Main results
To test hypotheses H1a and H2a, Table 3 provides the results of estimating
model (3) with cash flow Jones discretionary accruals as the dependent variable
and engagement and review partner tenure as our main independent variables. We
use absolute accruals measures as well as positive and negative accruals as our
dependent variable specifications. Following Myers et al. (2003) and Chi et al.
(2009) we report our findings from the truncated regressions instead of ordinary
least squares regression for the positive and negative accruals sub-samples, to
significant negative effect of review partner tenure (p<0.10). That is, longer
18
The correlation matrix (see Table 7) indicates strong correlation between our variables of
interest. To ensure that correlation among the predictors does not lead to ill-conditioned regression
we calculate variance inflation factors (VIF) and tolerance values for all relevant variables to
detect possible collinearity between the independent variables in the regression models. Values of
VIF exceeding 10 are often thought to indicate multicollinearity, but, in weaker models, values
above 2.5 may be a cause for concern. A small tolerance value indicates that the variable under
consideration is an almost perfectly linear combination of the independent variables already found
in the equation and that this variable should not be added to the regression equation. VIF values
for our models range from 1.02 to 1.57 and tolerance values range from 0.63 to 0.98. Thus, we do
not observe issues of multicollinearity in our models.
27
signed values of cash flow Jones discretionary accruals by splitting our sample
into positive and negative accruals, we find a positive effect of review partner
tenure for the negative accruals sub-sample (p<0.10). Overall, these results imply
accounting, while engagement partner tenure is associated with none of the three
H1b and H2b, we run the regression model (4) again with the cash flow Jones
find a significant positive effect of review partner rotation (p<0.05). That is,
sample into firms with positive and negative accruals, we observe more extreme
review partner switch (p<0.01). In other words, a new review partner constrains
28
partner.19 We find no evidence suggesting a change in accounting behavior after
Finally, results indicate that audit firm tenure is negatively associated with
examination of the signed values of accruals reveals that an increase in audit firm
5. Sensitivity analyses
We test the robustness of our results using four alternative measures of accruals.
Jones model. Prior research suggests that current accruals are more sensitive to
audit quality than measures based on total accruals. Second, we adopt current
19
Univariate results support this finding. More specifically, we find a significant difference and
higher negative discretionary accruals in the period following a review partner switch.
20
We repeat all of our analyses using different control variable specifications (not tabulated).
First, when measuring SIZE as the logarithm of total assets, the results are similar. Furthermore,
when GROWTH is measured as the annual change in total assets or change in sales, the results
remain equally unchanged. Finally, we re-perform our main analysis with the exclusion of audit
firm switches. Our results remain constant.
29
accruals21 and abnormal working capital accruals 22 as two additional measures of
audit quality.
estimate models (3) and (4). For brevity, we only report the coefficients on
results, with few exceptions. First, as shown in Table 5, review partner tenure is
significantly and negatively associated with three of the four absolute accruals
(see Panel A), and with two of the four negative accruals (see Panel B),
accounting, consistent with our primary results. Second, Table 6 shows that
review partner rotation leads to more income-decreasing accounting for all of the
results pertaining to the tenure and rotation of the engagement partner are not
21
We define Current Accruals following Myers et al. (2003).
/ 1, where = change in current assets between the first half of year t and
the second half of year t - 1; = change in cash and cash equivalent between the first half
of year t and the second half of year t - 1; = change in current liabilities between the first half
of year t and the second half of year t - 1; , = change in short-term debt between the first
half of year t and the second half of year t - 1 ; = total assets at the end of year t – 1.
22
We define Abnormal Working Capital Accruals, following DeFond and Park 2001.
where = noncash working capital at the
end of the first half of year t = (current assets - cash and cash equivalent) - (current liabilities -
short-term debt); SALES, = sales revenue in the first half of year t.
30
significant. Thus, our findings related to partner tenure and rotation are robust
Difference-in-difference analysis
experiencing a rotation of one of the two respective partners (treatment group) are
matched with a weighted average (using propensity scores based on year and firm
perform these tests for our three main dependent variable specifications (absolute,
constellations exist in the sample period, which might potentially affect our
31
results differentially. Non-tabulated findings from four regression analyses
provide further insights into the various possibilities. First, a rotation effect might
be present only if there is a joint rotation of the engagement and the review
partner (EPS & RPS); however, we find no support for this contention. Second, it
is possible that rotation affects audit quality, regardless of which partner rotates
(EPS or RPS); indeed, regression results preliminarily indicate that this is the
partner rotation or review partner rotation only (EPS versus RPS) suggest that
audit quality is affected only by rotation of the review partner but not the
Descriptive evidence indicates that in 124 (58) cases the engagement (review)
partner rotated to become the review (engagement) partner. To ensure that these
specific forms of rotation do not drive our results, we run two regression models
(not tabulated) comparing switches from one to the other audit partner role against
one to the other partner role. However, extending all our primary models to
control for differences in audit quality for the above-mentioned cases strengthens
our main results. This indicates that audit quality changes can be solely attributed
23
Our results hold when we instead include additional control variables in all our main regression
models for joint, exclusive and one-of-both rotation.
32
to regular rotation effects but not to switches in the role, i.e., from audit to review
Our sample includes 30 (23) cases where the review (engagement) partner
rotates after the required tenure period of seven years. In 23 cases the review
partner rotates after the seven-year period but the engagement partner rotates after
less than seven years. A total of 16 companies experience a rotation of the audit
engagement partner after seven years but the review partner rotated before. In
seven cases both partners rotate jointly after seven years. An exclusion of the
above-mentioned cases leads to unchanged results for our main models indicating
no difference between audit firms that comply with the rotation requirement and
of the function of the two partners) we perform additional tests (not tabulated).
More specifically, we include one variable that captures the longest tenure of
either the respective audit engagement or review partner tenure. Results indicate
quality; hence, we conclude that the distinction between the engagement and
33
6. Conclusion
partner rotation argue that an increase of auditor tenure might impair audit partner
requisite knowledge about the client and hence produce high quality audits.
partner-level) data, and the results are mixed. Furthermore, to our knowledge no
prior research distinguishes between engagement partner and review partner when
partner switches, the current study draws on the unique opportunity to identify
engagement partner tenure on audit quality (Chi and Huang 2005; Carey and
Simnett 2006) and other research shows a positive relationship (Chen et al. 2008;
engagement partner rotation and audit quality (Chi et al. 2009), rotation is not
associated with audit quality in the current study. Instead, review partner tenure is
34
in our study positively associated with audit quality, and review partner rotation is
associated with lower audit quality, inconsistent with the Taiwanese results by
Chi et al. (2009). A possible explanation for our observations is that review
involvement with the client is relatively limited, whereas review partner rotation
independence explanations might rule out each other for engagement partner
study. First, our accrual measures are only an indirect proxy for audit quality. As
a result, a limitation in our study (as in most prior literature) is that the results are
of accrual determinants, and our inferences are dependent on the quality of these
models. Therefore, the empirical tests in the paper have to be interpreted as joint
tests of the quality of the set of economic determinants, the functional form of
accruals accounting models, and the theory related to audit quality. Third, as
consistently and considerably shorter than the mandated maximum of seven years.
As such, even with a period spanning from 1995 to 2010, with mandatory rotation
35
of key audit partners effective at the earliest in 2002, caution is recommended
when generalizing our results to the potential effects of mandatory rotation, since
other unobservable factors might influence the voluntary choice to switch prior to
the allowed maximum tenure. Overall short tenure might further be the reason for
the absence of observed tenure effects in the chosen sample, and rotation effects
audit quality over a longer time horizon under the mandatory audit partner
mandatory audit partner rotation may well change when it becomes the standard.
policies that tenure reduces audit quality. We even provide some evidence against
the benefits of partner rotation, particularly for review partners. We suggest that
regulators should distinguish between the roles of key audit partners to ensure
36
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TABLE 1
Data description
43
TABLE 2
Summary statistics
n (%)
Engagement partner rotation 758 (28.76)
Review partner rotation 687 (26.06)
from engagement to review partner 124 (4.70)
from review to engagement partner 58 (2.20)
from review to engagement partner and engagement to
review partner 19 (0.72)
Simultaneous rotation of engagement and review partner 263 (9.98)
Audit firm rotation 228 (8.65)
with engagement partner rotation 189 (7.09)
with review partner rotation 199 (7.55)
with simultaneous rotation of engagement and review partner 174 (6.60)
without any partner rotation 24 (0.09)
and rotation from engagement to review partner 4 (0.15)
and rotation from review to engagement partner 5 (0.19)
and rotation from review to engagement partner and
engagement to review partner 1 (0.04)
44
TABLE 2 (Continued)
Notes:
* Since we do not know for how long switching audit firms audited a given
company before 1995, the descriptive details cannot be interpreted as the real-
world mean of audit firm tenure.
45
TABLE 2 (Continued)
Control variables
Firm Tenure 4.33763 4.00 2.88091
Big4 0.54590 1.0000 0.49798
Size 6.02916 5.837563 2.18880
Growth 0.08817 0.04884 0.45655
Cashflow 0.02445 0.03620 0.17545
Lifecycle 0.53586 0.03243 8.23201
46
TABLE 3
Cashflow Jones discretionary accruals and engagement or review partner tenure
Notes:
All variables are winsorized at the 1% and 99% levels.
Robust t-statistics and z-statistics clustered by firm are in parentheses, respectively.
*significant at 10%; ** significant at 5%; *** significant at 1% (two-tailed)
47
TABLE 4
Cashflow Jones discretionary accruals and engagement or review partner rotation
Notes:
All variables are winsorized at the 1% and 99% levels.
Robust t-statistics and z-statistics clustered by firm are in parentheses, respectively.
*significant at 10%; ** significant at 5%; *** significant at 1% (two-tailed)
48
TABLE 5
Alternative measures of accruals and engagement or review partner tenure
Absolute accruals
EP tenure RP tenure
Performance-matched model 0.00057 -0.00262
(0.40) (-1.81)*
Modified performance-matched model 0.00124 -0.00265
(0.86) (-1.83)*
Abnormal working capital accruals 0.00114 -0.00348
(0.67) (-2.02)**
Current accruals 0.00071 -0.00127
(0.46) (-0.79)
Notes:
All variables are winsorized at the 1% and 99% levels.
Robust t-statistics and z-statistics clustered by firm are in parentheses, respectively.
*significant at 10%; ** significant at 5%; *** significant at 1% (two-tailed)
49
TABLE 6
Alternative measures of accruals and engagement or review partner rotation
Absolute accruals
EPS RPS
Performance-matched model 0.00070 0.01287
(0.14) (2.43)**
Modified performance-matched model -0.00133 0.01406
(-0.27) (2.60)***
Abnormal working capital accruals -0.00611 0.01784
(-1.07) (2.62)***
Current accruals -0.00159 0.01092
(-0.27) (1.76)*
Notes:
All variables are winsorized at the 1% and 99% levels.
Robust t-statistics and z-statistics clustered by firm are in parentheses. respectively.
*significant at 10%; ** significant at 5%; *** significant at 1% (two-tailed)
50
TABLE 7
Correlation matrix
Engagement Review
partner partner
EPS RPS Tenure tenure tenure
EPS 1
RPS 0.2008 1
(0.0000)
Tenure 0.0606 0.082 1
(0.0035) (0.0001)
Engagement -0.5201 -0.0522 0.3401 1
Partner tenure (0.0000) (0.012) (0.0000)
Review -0.051 -0.4993 0.3395 0.4034 1
Partner tenure (0.0141) (0.0000) (0.0000) (0.0000)
51