감사품질이 유지되는 적정 감사기간 = Optimal Audit Tenure for Audit Quality

국문 초록 (Abstract)

특정 기업을 연속하여 감사하게 되면 감사인과 피감사인 간의 유대관계가 형성되어 감사인의 독립성이 감소될 가능성이 있다. 반면, 연속감사로 인해 피감사기업에 대한 지식과 경험을 축적해 나갈 수 있기 때문에 회계감사의 효율성이 제고된다는 견해도 존재한다. 따라서 연속감사는 감사품질에 있어서는 양날의 검이 될 수 있다(Brooks et al. 2012).
감사초기에는 전문성이 부족하겠지만 독립성은 높을 것이다. 그러나 연속해서 감사하게 되면 전문성이 높아지는 정도보다 독립성이 감소되는 정도가 더 커져서 감사품질이 하락하는 시점(즉, 전환시점)에 도달하게 될 것이다. 또한 Big N과 non-Big N 회계법인의 감사품질이 유지되는 기간이 다를 수 있다. 일반적으로 Big N 회계법인이 non-Big N 회계법인보다 시스템이 전문화되어 있기 때문에 상대적으로 전문성이 꾸준히 향상될 수 있다. 또한 감사실패에 따른 Big N 회계법인의 명성을 잃는 등의 손실이 non-Big N회계법인보다 더 클 수 있다. 따라서 감사품질이 유지되는 기간도 길어질 것으로 예상된다.
본 연구는 다음과 같은 두 가지 목적을 수행한다. 첫째는 연속감사 계약기간동안 감사품질이 유지되는 기간 즉, 감사품질이 하락되는 전환시점을 찾고자 하였다. 둘째는 Big N과 non-Big N 회계법인에 따라 감사품질이 감소되는 전환시점이 다른지 검증한다.
분석결과, 감사 초기인 1차 감사계약기간(3년, T1)은 감사품질이 낮았으나 T4(12년) 기간까지 감사품질이 좋아지는 것으로 나타났다. 또한 Big N 회계법인인 경우 감사품질이 유지되는 기간은 non-Big N 회계법인보다 더 긴 것으로 나타났다. 본 연구의 분석결과에 의하면, Big N이 연속 감사를 할 때 평균적으로 12년 정도는 non-Big N과 감사품질이 유사하지만 T5(13-15년)의 기간에도 감사품질이 향상되는 것으로 나타나 전환시점이 12년 이후인 것을 알 수 있었다. 본 연구결과는 감사인의 빈번한 교체는 감사의 질에 부정적인 영향을 줄 수 있다는 증거를 보여주고 있으며, 앞으로 감사인 변경에 관한 정책을 결정할 때 의미 있는 시사점을 제시하고 있다.

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Previous literatures have indicated that the longer continuing audit period is, the more severe auditor independence will be impaired through closer relationship maintained between auditors and clients. However, others say that longer continuing audit is likely to increase audit effectiveness by building up auditors’ knowledge and experience about a specific client. Thus, long-audit tenure might be a double-edged sword on the audit quality (Brooks et al. 2013).
In the beginning years of the audit, auditors’ expertise was lacking while auditors’ independence was high. However, as time passed by, audit quality began to decrease when the effect of the higher auditor’s expertise no longer offsets the effect of the lower auditor’s independence. The year where audit quality was declined became its turning point. In addition, its turning point between Big N and non-BigN audit firm may be different. Generally, Big N audit firm can steadily be improved because it is more specialized than non-Big N audit firms. The loss of Big N audit firm’s reputation due to audit failure may also be greater than that of non-Big N audit firms. Thus, the period at which the audit quality is maintained on Big N audit firm is expected to be longer. Lately, in the United States and the European countries, the audit quality’s turning point is expected to be 10 years or more, while the auditor mandatory rotation system is being discussed again. Thus, such studies will need to be carried out. In Korea, there are few studies in 2001 to 2003 and they resulted that continuous audit period is not related to audit quality. After that, considering that subsequent follow-up studies have not yet conducted, the study on audit quality of continuous audit period will need to be performed.
This study has two purposes. First, it examines empirically whether a turning point exists when audit quality tends to decline as audit tenure becomes longer. Second, it investigates whether this turning point varies depending on audit firms, which is defined by BigN and non-BigN auditors.
This study finds that audit quality tends to decrease in the first contract period (3 years) following auditor rotation. However, it is likely to come back in the 2nd contract period, and then improve during the 3rd and 4th. Also, for the BigN auditor, this improvement tends to continue even to the 5th contract period. These results show that the positive impact of longer-tenure on audit quality is probably driven by BigN auditors and that optimal audit tenure might not be shorter than 4th contract period (12 years).
The results present some evidence that frequent auditor rotation may have negative effects on audit quality and those effects may be more significant for Big N auditors. Therefore, it could provide meaningful implication in making policy decisions on auditors’ rotation in the future.

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