关键词:

超额商誉, 审计契约, 审计师变更

Abstract:

Excess goodwill not only carries operational risk, but is often associated with the risk of financial misstatements, thereby increasing the risk faced by auditors. Will excess goodwill affect the stability of audit contract？This paper, using the data of Chinese A-share non-financial listed companies from 2007 to 2019,  examines the impact of excess goodwill of listed companies on auditor change. The results show that the higher the excess goodwill of the client, the more unstable the audit contract, i.e., the greater the possibility of auditor change. Moreover, this impact only exists in situations where the client’s control risk and legal risk are high. Further tests show that the client’s excess goodwill has a significantly positive correlation with the possibility of auditor’s resignation and upward change, but there is no significant correlation of goodwill risk with the possibility of auditor’s downward change. In addition, the mechanism analysis finds that excess goodwill will increase the client’s operation risk and financial misstatement risk, which then leads to an auditor change. This paper expands the literature on auditors’ attitudes and responses to client’s excess goodwill risk from the perspective of stability of audit contract.

Key words:

excess goodwill, audit contract, auditor change