IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/advacc/v32y2016icp1-9.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Managing risk in a poor economy: The association between economic activity and auditor response to risk

Author

Listed:
  • Bagley, Penelope
  • Dorminey, Jack W.
  • McSwain, Dwayne
  • Reed, Tracy

Abstract

We examine the association between economic climate and auditor risk acceptance as measured by the auditors' reaction to internal control weaknesses. We hypothesize and find that auditors address risk in a way that is conditioned on the economic environment. In particular, we find that during periods of weak economic activity, auditors tend to assess lower risk premiums and are less likely to resign in response to an adverse ICFR opinion. However, we find evidence that economic factors do not influence fees assessed by incoming auditors following a resignation in the presence of an ICFR weakness. Our results indicate that auditors modify their engagement risk strategies during challenging economic times and accept higher levels of risk to attract and retain clients. For the riskiest clients, however, economic factors do not appear to influence auditors' risk pricing.

Suggested Citation

  • Bagley, Penelope & Dorminey, Jack W. & McSwain, Dwayne & Reed, Tracy, 2016. "Managing risk in a poor economy: The association between economic activity and auditor response to risk," Advances in accounting, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 1-9.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:advacc:v:32:y:2016:i:c:p:1-9
    DOI: 10.1016/j.adiac.2015.05.001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0882611015000292
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.adiac.2015.05.001?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Chris E. Hogan & Michael S. Wilkins, 2008. "Evidence on the Audit Risk Model: Do Auditors Increase Audit Fees in the Presence of Internal Control Deficiencies?," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 25(1), pages 219-242, March.
    2. Johnson, W. Bruce & Lys, Thomas, 1990. "The market for audit services : Evidence from voluntary auditor changes," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1-3), pages 281-308, January.
    3. Karla M. Johnstone & Jean C. Bedard, 2004. "Audit Firm Portfolio Management Decisions," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(4), pages 659-690, September.
    4. Zhan Shu, Susan, 2000. "Auditor resignations: clientele effects and legal liability," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(2), pages 173-205, April.
    5. Bockus, K & Gigler, F, 1998. "A theory of auditor resignation," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(2), pages 191-208.
    6. Ettredge, Michael & Fuerherm, Elizabeth Emeigh & Li, Chan, 2014. "Fee pressure and audit quality," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 39(4), pages 247-263.
    7. Doyle, Jeffrey & Ge, Weili & McVay, Sarah, 2007. "Determinants of weaknesses in internal control over financial reporting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(1-2), pages 193-223, September.
    8. Andrew J. Leone & Sarah Rice & Joseph P. Weber & Michael Willenborg, 2013. "How Do Auditors Behave During Periods of Market Euphoria? The Case of Internet IPOs," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(1), pages 182-214, March.
    9. Ashbaugh-Skaife, Hollis & Collins, Daniel W. & Kinney Jr., William R., 2007. "The discovery and reporting of internal control deficiencies prior to SOX-mandated audits," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(1-2), pages 166-192, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lyubov Plotnikova & V. V. Rubanov, 2020. "The Internal Control System as a Management Function and the Element of Integrated Reporting Financial Statements," International Journal of Financial Research, International Journal of Financial Research, Sciedu Press, vol. 11(6), pages 262-269, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. DeFond, Mark & Zhang, Jieying, 2014. "A review of archival auditing research," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(2), pages 275-326.
    2. Mande, Vivek & Son, Myungsoo & Song, Hakjoon, 2017. "Auditor search periods as signals of engagement risk: Effects on auditor choice and audit pricing," Advances in accounting, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 15-29.
    3. Vivek Mande & Myungsoo Son, 2011. "Do audit delays affect client retention?," Managerial Auditing Journal, Emerald Group Publishing, vol. 26(1), pages 32-50, January.
    4. Sellers, R. Drew & Fogarty, Timothy J. & Jadallah, Jadallah, 2020. "Has the new world order taught the big four to manage client portfolio risk? Examining extreme loss occurrences before and after Sarbanes Oxley," Advances in accounting, Elsevier, vol. 51(C).
    5. Chan, Lilian H. & Chen, Kevin C.W. & Chen, Tai-Yuan & Yu, Yangxin, 2012. "The effects of firm-initiated clawback provisions on earnings quality and auditor behavior," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(2), pages 180-196.
    6. Pan, Yue & Shroff, Nemit & Zhang, Pengdong, 2023. "The dark side of audit market competition," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(1).
    7. Skaife, Hollis A. & Veenman, David & Wangerin, Daniel, 2013. "Internal control over financial reporting and managerial rent extraction: Evidence from the profitability of insider trading," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 91-110.
    8. Inder K. Khurana & Hoyoun Kyung, 2021. "Internal control material weakness and CEO recruitment," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(9-10), pages 1940-1987, October.
    9. Ji, Xu-dong & Lu, Wei & Qu, Wen, 2018. "Internal control risk and audit fees: Evidence from China," Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 266-287.
    10. Der-Fen Huang & Ming-Lei Chang, 2016. "Do auditor-provided tax services improve the relation between tax-related internal control and book-tax differences?," Asia-Pacific Journal of Accounting & Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(2), pages 177-199, June.
    11. Omrane Guedhami & Jeffrey A. Pittman & Walid Saffar, 2014. "Auditor Choice in Politically Connected Firms," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(1), pages 107-162, March.
    12. Weiss, Renee & Kalbers, Lawrence, 2013. "Determinants of auditor changes for non-accelerated filers," Research in Accounting Regulation, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 13-29.
    13. Beng Wee Goh & Jayanthi Krishnan & Dan Li, 2013. "Auditor Reporting under Section 404: The Association between the Internal Control and Going Concern Audit Opinions," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(3), pages 970-995, September.
    14. Tatiana Mazza & Stefano Azzali, 2014. "The Severity of Internal Controls over Financial Reporting Deficiencies: Differences among Types and Industries," FINANCIAL REPORTING, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2014(1), pages 55-77.
    15. Donghui Wu & Qing Ye, 2020. "Public Attention and Auditor Behavior: The Case of Hurun Rich List in China," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(3), pages 777-825, June.
    16. Navarro, Patricia & Robb, Sean W.G. & Sutton, Steve G. & Weisner, Martin M., 2020. "The cost stickiness of information technology material weaknesses: An intertemporal comparison between it-related and other material weaknesses," International Journal of Accounting Information Systems, Elsevier, vol. 37(C).
    17. Griffin, Paul A. & Lont, David H., 2011. "Audit fees around dismissals and resignations: Additional evidence," Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 65-81.
    18. Todd D. Kravet & Sarah E. McVay & David P. Weber, 2018. "Costs and benefits of internal control audits: evidence from M&A transactions," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 23(4), pages 1389-1423, December.
    19. Samer Khalil, 2011. "The riskiness of audit firm continuing clients' portfolio," Managerial Auditing Journal, Emerald Group Publishing, vol. 26(4), pages 335-349, April.
    20. Hoffman, Benjamin W. & Sellers, R. Drew & Skomra, Justyna, 2018. "The impact of client information technology capability on audit pricing," International Journal of Accounting Information Systems, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 59-75.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:advacc:v:32:y:2016:i:c:p:1-9. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/advances-in-accounting/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.