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The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of board characteristics and external audit quality on earnings management among major Tunisian banks over the period 2003-2007.

Multivariate regressions are employed to test the effect of board structure and external audit quality on discretionary provisions as a proxy for earnings management.

Results indicate that among the characteristics of the board, CEO duality is associated with higher levels of discretionary provisions. However, the presence of directors affiliated to the largest shareholder tends to constrain earnings management practices. The results reveal also that a co-audit belonging to the BIG 4 provides incentives to manage earnings while the capacity of the external auditor to disclose reservations impacts negatively the manager's discretion.

First, it is not desirable to appoint a co-audit both belonging to the BIG 4. Second, the presence of affiliated directors reduces the discretionary practices except in cases where directors are affiliated to families. In this case, banks should strengthen the presence of independent directors. Finally, the delineation of the leeway left in the Tunisian accounting standards would provide more transparent financial information.

This study contributes to the literature on governance and its impact on earnings management among Tunisian banks by introducing two variables that have not been tested before which are affiliated directors and co-audit. The paper will be of value to banks willing to comply with the Governance Good Practice Guide adopted recently in Tunisia.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the use of a dual‐audit/joint‐audit process and the level of compliance with IFRS in listed Kuwaiti financial institutions.

An OLS‐regression model was used to test the relationship among dual‐audit/joint‐audit process and the level of compliance with IFRS‐disclosure. The sample was based on 33 firm observations in 2006.

The main results reveal that financial institutions audited by dual‐auditors were more compliant with IFRS‐required disclosure than financial institutions audited by joint‐auditors.

The authors have assumed that the work done by both auditors is as per the Central Bank of Kuwait (CBK) circular which obligates both auditors to do their fieldwork independently and then consolidate their work before issuing the final audit report. In the authors’ opinion, it is less likely that both auditors will not comply with CBK regulation, especially because CBK has the right to ban a non‐compliant audit firm from auditing banks. The authors did not ask audit firms whether they are complying with this circular because it was believed that audit firms would not disclose a non‐compliance issue with regulators to outsiders.

This paper provides empirical evidence about the effectiveness of using dual‐auditors in promoting compliance with IFRS‐disclosure.

To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to explore the association between the levels of compliance with IFRS‐disclosure and the dual/joint audit process in the financial institutions listed on the Kuwait Stock Exchange.

Examines whether audit delay of Bangladeshi companies is associated with audit firms’ links with international firms. The study is based on a sample of 115 listed companies of the Dhaka Stock Exchange for the year ended 1998. A non‐parametric tool has been used to find whether any significant difference exists among audit firms. The results of previous studies on audit delay show that firms associated with international audit firms appear to provide motivation for shorter audit delays. However, this study reveals that firms associated with international firms in Bangladesh have longer audit delays with a mean of 6.31 months, whereas the overall mean is 5.86 months.

This paper aims to study how audit committee member expertise is related to certain features of the committee and to the audit process.

Based on information from 2,477 directors from 296 firms in eight European countries between 2005 and 2014, this study measures average audit committee expertise using a continuous variable, which combines education-based and experience-based expertise. Different measures of the audit process are then regressed against this and other control variables.

Average committee expertise has increased in recent years. Education-based and experience-based expertise seem to be complementary. Results also show that committees with greater expertise meet more frequently, have fewer directors with full-time dedication and pay lower audit fees. There is no link to changes in the external firm audit, which may be due to mandatory auditor rotation.

The paper provides a comprehensive metric of audit committee expertise that includes directors’ academic background, professional experience and qualifications. In addition, this study expands current knowledge concerning whether and how committee expertise affects the audit process.

Library Workstation and PC Report, founded in 1984 as M300 and PC Report, was the brainchild of Allan Pratt, then at the University of Arizona. Pratt, the founding editor of Small Computers in Libraries, had a hunch that OCLC's introduction of the M300 workstation was going to call for much hand‐holding and specialist advice and information for librarians. He was right. M300 and PC Report had a subscribership well before the first issue was mailed to readers. And it remains a growing publication to this day.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse whether the major international audit firms reach collusive agreements in Spain, in order to exercise market power and impose higher prices than those of competitors. According to the traditional theory of oligopoly, the ability to achieve these agreements is dependent primarily on the high level of market concentration, so that multiple studies have analysed the relationship between concentration and prices. However, the concentration has serious limitations to infer collusion and therefore the exercise of market power (Dedman and Lennox, 2009).

Based on an alternative current of the theory of industrial organisation, the authors use measures of industrial mobility as a measure of collusion or rivalry of firms in oligopolistic markets.

The results reveal that international audit firms do not reach collusive agreements to limit competition between them.

According to the empirical evidence obtained, the measures taken by the regulatory bodies to avoid market concentration would not be necessary or efficient and they would have significant costs for the audit market (GAO, 2003, 2008; FRC, 2009; European Commission, 2010; Competition Commission, 2013).

To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to introduce mobility measures to explain market collusion and the exercise of market power in the audit market.

El objetivo de este trabajo es analizar si las Grandes Firmas Internacionales de auditoría alcanzan acuerdos colusivos en España con la finalidad de ejercer poder de mercado e imponer precios superiores a los de los competidores. Según la teoría tradicional del oligopolio, la capacidad para alcanzar estos acuerdos se hace depender fundamentalmente del alto nivel de concentración del mercado, por lo que múltiples estudios han analizado la relación entre concentración y precios. Sin embargo, la concentración presenta serias limitaciones para inferir la colusión y, por tanto, el ejercicio del poder de mercado (Dedman y Lennox, 2009).

Basándonos en una corriente alternativa de la teoría de la organización industrial, utilizamos medidas de movilidad industrial como medida de la colusión o rivalidad de las empresas en mercados oligopolistas.

Nuestros resultados revelan que las firmas internacionales de auditoría no alcanzan acuerdos colusivos para limitar la competencia entre ellas.

Según la evidencia empírica que obtenemos, las medidas adoptadas por los organismos reguladores con la finalidad de desconcentrar el mercado, las cuales presentan importantes costes para el mercado de auditoría, no resultarían ni necesarias ni eficientes (GAO, 2003, 2008; FRC, 2009; Comisión Europea, 2010; Competition Commission, 2013).

Hasta donde conocemos, éste es el primer estudio que introduce medidas de movilidad del mercado para explicar la colusión y el ejercicio del poder de mercado en el mercado de auditoría.

The entry of significant numbers of women into managerial positions over the past two decades has prompted considerable interest in their experiences and, more recently, in their progress through the various levels of management. An examination of the circumstances presently facing such women paints a discouraging picture: some investigations indicate that highly qualified, competent individuals feel disappointed and disillusioned with their experiences in organizations (Gallese, 1985; Hardesty, & Jacobs, 1986). Other reports suggest that female executives face formidable structural and attitudinal barriers which virtually preclude advancement to upper management echelons (Fierman, 1990; Morrison, White, & Van Velsor, 1987; Nicholson, & West, 1988). In addition, recent media accounts proclaim that massive numbers of corporate women are choosing to ‘bail out’ in favor of entrepreneurial self‐employment or full‐time homemaking (Maynard, 1988; Taylor, 1986).

The interdependence of ecology and the economy has become a highly significant feature in contemporary European business society. This degree of interdependency emphasizes the need for compatibility of the goals of economic growth, environmental protection and the rational management of natural resources. The issues are not predominantly centred on economic growth versus environmental sustainability, but rather on the pragmatic acknowledgement that there needs to be recognition and compromise between competing aims. Seeks to examine European Union regulations relating to business environmental issues and to analyse the legal, political and professional adaptation processes of environmental regulation in Spain and the UK.

The purpose of this study is to examine both the responses of auditees to corporate governance audit (CGA) regulation and the practices of CGA auditors.

The study used a mixed method. Content analysis of 200 annual and CGA reports was carried out for 13 years, from 2008 to 2021, split into voluntary disclosure and mandatory disclosure periods. Quantitative analysis was also conducted using Kruskal–Wallis and Dunn's tests. Data gathered were interpreted through the lens of isomorphism and Oliver's (1991) strategic responses to institutional processes.

The study revealed that in the voluntary disclosure period, auditees responded mainly with acquiescence, motivated by mimetic isomorphic pressure. In the mandatory disclosure period, auditee responses ranged from acquiescence to dismissal of corporate governance regulation (i.e. coercive isomorphic pressure). Auditor reporting of CGA findings was found to be heterogeneous, suggesting that normative and mimetic isomorphism did not homogenize auditor practices.

The absence of uniform auditee responses to CGA regulation during the mandatory disclosure period suggests that the purpose of mandating the regulation has not yet been achieved and may signal inadequate coercive isomorphic pressure from the Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria (FRCN). Similarly, heterogeneous reporting of CGA findings by corporate governance auditors inhibits the comparability of audit findings, limiting their value for information users.

This study examines corporate governance auditor practices and auditee responses to corporate governance audit regulation.

This paper aims to examine the impact of the auditor's characteristics on bank's earnings management (EM) through loan loss provisions (LLP) for African banks.

This study is based on 360 bank-year observations from 14 African countries for the period 2011–2016, discretionary LLP is used as proxy for EM. Panel regressions have been conducted.

The authors' findings reveal that auditor's industry specialization and tenure exert a negative and significant influence on the extent of LLP-based EM. The results also show that total fees paid to the banks' auditors are positively related to the extent of EM. In a further analysis, the authors find that industry specialist auditors are more effective in reducing the incoming-increasing. Similarly, the positive relationship previously found between EM and total fees still holds only for income-increasing. Moreover, auditor tenure negatively impacts both income-increasing and income-decreasing EM. As for auditor change, results reveal differential effect on EM.

The current research extends prior literature and provides an understanding of an important external monitoring mechanism, the external audit, within African banks. To the best of the authors' knowledge, there is a paucity of cross-country studies that has addressed the influence of auditors' attributes on banks' EM in Africa.