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By conducting the 2006 global Common Body of Knowledge (CBOK) study, The Institute of Internal Auditors (The IIA) attempts to better understand the expanding scope of internal auditing practice throughout the world. The purpose of this review of recent internal auditing literature in The Americas is to document how the internal audit function is changing in response to the shifts in global business practices.

The literature in The Americas is reviewed with a focus on developments that have implications for the expanded scope of internal auditing and the changing skill sets of internal auditors. This focus has implications for CBOK 2006.

The literature indicates a paradigm shift in the activities performed by internal auditors. The increasing complexity of business transactions, a more dynamic regulatory environment in the USA, and significant advances in information technology have resulted in opportunities and challenges for internal auditors. Although in 2004, The IIA responded to the changing organizational environment by updating the professional practices framework, more work needs to be done to prepare internal auditors for the expanded set of skills and knowledge required to perform audits of the future.

By presenting an overview of past literature in The Americas and discussing the shifting demands on internal audit services, the researchers hope to motivate further research in the field.

The aim of this paper is to investigate a number of factors that are theoretically associated with convergence toward best practices in internal auditing.

The paper defines best practices as internal audit tools and techniques that are used by at least 67 percent of the internal audit functions (IAFs) in the USA. A sample of 26 countries and data from 1,708 IAFs were used in this study.

The paper finds evidence of a high degree of de facto convergence of internal auditing practices toward US best practices. It also finds that IAFs in emerging countries converge more rapidly to best practices than IAFs in developed countries. Finally, the use of the Institute of Internal Auditors' (IIA) Standards and an external quality assessment in the past three years are found to be positively and significantly associated with convergence toward US best practices.

The most important limitation of the data used in the study is that they reflect respondents' perceptions, which may deviate from reality. Also, data were only available for one‐half of the emerging countries listed in the MSCI Global Standards Index. Limitations aside, this study has significant implications for future research investigating various factors associated with emerging countries rapidly converging toward US best practices.

The results support the IIA's efforts to unify internal auditing practices around the world via its Standards. However, the additional analysis shows that the impact of the Standards is rather limited. The results also imply that formal assessment of internal auditing practices results in a more substantial change in the adoption of best practices.

The convergence of internal auditing is a part of the convergence of corporate governance practices which has become a topic of interest in academic research. While internal auditing has developed over a relatively long period of time in developed countries, such development must take place over a shorter period of time in emerging countries to catch up with developed countries. The current study's findings indicate that convergence of internal auditing practice is not context‐free.

This paper aims to develop a descriptive framework of the components of intellectual capital in annual reports. The paper also aims to investigate the effects of disclosure of intellectual capital on market capitalization.

The components of intellectual capital are used as units of analysis to content analyze the annual reports of a sample of 58 Fortune 500 companies over the five‐year period of 1993‐1997.

The frequency of disclosure of information about brand and proprietary processes has increased over the study period. The results also point to significant differences between the “new” and “old” economy sectors with respect to intellectual capital categories of brand and partnerships where there is more disclosure by “old” economy sector and information technology and intellectual property where there is more disclosure by the “new” economy sector. Finally, the results show a highly significant effect for the intellectual capital disclosure on market capitalization.

The time period is limited to the years before the market excesses of the late 1990s and the market decline of the 2000s. The results have significant implications for setting standards of disclosure of intellectual capital in annual reports.

This is the first paper to provide information on disclosure of intellectual capital by fortune 500 companies in the USA. Its results have value for various users of annual reports who seek to understand the ways in which companies disclose information about their intellectual capital.