We investigate the stock market's reaction to events leading up to the Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) and Public Company Accounting Oversight Board's (PCAOB) 2007 regulatory changes that reduced the scope of and documentation requirements for assessments of firms' internal controls...

Advanced audit data analytics tools allow auditors to analyze the entire population of accessible client transactions. Though this approach has measurable benefits for audit efficiency and effectiveness, auditors caution that it does not incrementally increase the level of assurance expressed...

The spread of COVID-19 and the drastic blockages that followed led to the placement of economies and labor markets around the world in a state of emergency. Governments are fighting to protect jobs and businesses. Some of the measures identified and implemented are short-term telework and...

Internal audit functions of organizations are regarded as crucial components of the combined assurance model, alongside the audit committee, management and external auditors. In this regard, internal audit plays a crucial role, insofar as it consists of experts in risk, governance and control...

This paper examines whether the opportunistic use of assets securitization for earnings management is systematically widespread. It is hypothesized that with the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, which imposed more stringent governance over the financial reporting process, there should...

In April 2018, Sir John Kingman was asked by the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) of the United Kingdom (UK) to undertake an independent review of the Financial Reporting Council (FRC). The Kingman review which was published in December 2018 made...

This paper investigates whether the level of customer concentration can moderate the effect of the Sarbanes–Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) on the earnings management of U.S. corporations. Customer concentration can act as a mechanism for reducing agency problems by pressuring supplier firms to be...

We investigate the association between material weakness in internal controls (MW) disclosed under Section 302 of SOX and future stock price crash risk. We argue that relative to firms with effective internal controls, firms with MW have lower financial reporting precision. The lower reporting...