The European Public Audit Oversight Reform. Which Effect Does it Have on Audit Quality?

Masters Thesis from the year 2015 in the subject Economics - Other, grade: 8,0, Maastricht University (School of Business and Economics), language: English, abstract: This paper examines the effect of the European public audit oversight reform on audit quality. Accounting scandals at the beginning of the 21th century called the audit profession into question and raised serious concerns on the oversight system in place. In an attempt to regain investors confidence, the European Commission (hereafter referred to as EC) followed the American example and passed Directive 2006/43/EC, which requires the Member States of the European Union (hereafter referred to as EU) to set up public oversight systems for statutory auditors and audit firms. The paper provides empirical evidence that managers are less likely to commit earnings management in the years following the regulatory reform compared to the years preceding the reform, indicating higher audit quality in the post-reform period. Member States of the EU can choose between two options for national public oversight of auditors; the full-time inspection model and the model which consists of peer reviews with an independent commission monitoring this process. I run several analyses with different models and test whether firms in jurisdictions that implemented the full-time inspection model exhibit lower discretionary accruals compared to firms in jurisdictions that implemented the modified peer review model. The results are contradicting and do not support a conclusion.