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This study aims to investigate the effect of national culture (power distance, individualism, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance and long-term orientation) on audit report lag.

The authors use two econometric approaches (ordinary least squares (OLS) and quantile regression) using STATA software for a sample of 1,208 firm-year observations over the period of 2017–2018.

Using Hofstede’s (2001) cultural dimensions (power distance, individualism, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance and long-term orientation), the authors find that masculinity and long-term orientation are positively associated with audit report lag, while uncertainty avoidance is negatively associated with the same variable. Quantile regressions suggest that the adverse effect of masculinity on audit report lag is more prevailing for companies communicating companies' annual reports in a timely manner. Furthermore, the positive association between power distance and audit report lag exists only under tardy disclosure regime. Quantile regressions also confirm that the negative (positive) effect of uncertainty avoidance (long-term orientation) on audit report lag is maintained under different timely disclosure regime. Additional analysis conducted with respect to legal system shows that individualism becomes a significant predictor of audit delays with a significant negative effect for common law countries, while uncertainty avoidance has a positive effect on the same variable in civil law countries characterized by high level of discretion and secrecy.

The results of this study suggest that national culture as an informal institution may complement formal institutions (e.g. financial markets) in promoting timely disclosure. For instance, foreign investors may view high uncertainty avoidance scores, in common law emerging economies, as an indicator of transparency and timely disclosure.

This study adds to the extant literature a further understanding of the impact of cultural dimensions on timely disclosure, as proxied by, audit report lag. The use of quantile regression approach shows how different timely disclosure regime may affect the association between masculinity, power distance and audit report lag.

The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the characteristics of a CEO, that is, tenure and financial expertise, could affect the timeliness of an audit report.

Research data gathered from listed companies on the Tehran Stock Exchange during the four-year period 2013-2016.

The results obtained from model fittings indicated that there is only a negative and significant relationship between CEO financial expertise and natural logarithm of audit report lag and no significant relationship observed between the former and two other indices of timely audit report. Moreover, no significant relationship was found between the CEO tenure and other three indices of timely audit report.

This paper is the first study, which developed the literature of timely audit report using CEO tenure effect and financial expertise tests for timely audit reports in Iran.

This paper is motivated by the Financial Markets Authority’s (FMA) investigation into reporting delays of New Zealand issuers. The purpose of this paper is to provide regulators with systematic evidence on firm specific characteristics associated with reporting delay. The paper examines the audit report lag (ARL), the financial report lag and the corresponding interim report lags for a large sample of New Zealand listed firms.

Because of the small sample we report bivariate correlations. Together with OLS regression, we examine the association between reporting delay and firm characteristics (e.g., size, complexity, governance) that capture the supply and demand for timely audited financial reports. We choose a period immediately prior to the FMA enforcement of reporting delays to capture the voluntary choice of reporting timeliness by managers.

The audit lag (i.e. balance date to preliminary announcement to the NZX) is longer than the report lag (i.e. preliminary announcement date to the issuance of the report to the NZX). We find that audit risk factors (leverage and finance firms) and busy reporting period are associated with longer audit lag. Whereas, having a Big 4 auditor and an interim review reduces annual audit lag. Investor demand factors are associated with a shorter report lag. Firms with a loss and more segments have a shorter report lag, while firms with high market to book ratio have a longer report lag. These are consistent with agency and proprietary cost explanations. The interim report lag is only seven days shorter than the annual lag. The determinants of annual report lag provide weak explanations for the interim report lags.

Although all listed companies are sampled, the small sample size reduces the power of the analysis and may limit finding significant results at conventional levels.

The factors associated with reporting delays could be used by regulators as red flags to identify abnormal reporting delays. Interim reporting lags appear excessively relative to annual report lags. Therefore, regulators should investigate the reasons for the lack of timeliness of interim reports.

Report timeliness is an important, but often overlooked, component of accounting quality. The major social implication is that timely reporting reduces information asymmetry between managers and shareholders and other stakeholders. Making better, timelier decisions ought to increase the wealth and welfare of investors and other stakeholders.

There are many studies on reporting delay. However, prior evidence on reporting delay in New Zealand is pre-IFRS and pre-recent regulatory reforms (such as the formation of the FMA). Hence, our contribution is to provide more contemporary-relevant evidence. We also distinguish between ARL and the financial report lag and found that different firm characteristics drive these lags. We also examine the interim reporting lag.

Recent corporate scandals have resulted in a greater focus on business ethics and governance. The purpose of this study is to examine whether the existing audit regulatory framework adequately serves the legitimate interests of stakeholders.

This study is the first to collect survey data on audit regulatory issues in the post‐Lehman Brothers environment. In total, 190 responses to a mail survey were collected from Big Four auditors and from 166 CEOs. Stakeholder theory is used to analyse these responses.

The results indicate that Big Four auditors and CEOs perceive the disclosure of post‐audit report event evidence to be important in discharging their ethical obligations. Both groups agreed that issuing timely audit reports is important, and that “introducing quarterly audit reporting” is a necessary step to enhance corporate governance. A risk‐based auditing approach necessitates the introduction of quarterly reporting. The findings support the notion underlying business risk auditing (BRA) models developed in public practice and the literature. CEOs are acutely aware of their corporate responsibilities to the company's stakeholders, and demonstrate that they understand the core insights of stakeholder theory by applying this theory in the corporations they manage. These results support the assertion that stakeholder theory has managerial implications and intrinsic value. CEOs comply with their audit disclosure obligations in several ways. Based on the results, a refined stakeholder model is proposed and immediate regulatory reform is recommended.

This study extends the literature on the theoretical development of the stakeholder model, which will facilitate standard setters and regulators in the Asia‐Pacific region and their counterparts in other regions to devise standard guidelines and improve corporate governance.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether the characteristics of the audit committee (AC) chair affect audit report timeliness. In particular, the direct association between AC chair accounting expertise and audit report delay, and the moderating effect of other characteristics of AC chair on this association are examined.

To achieve the purpose of this study, the characteristics examined by this study are AC chair expertise, shareholding, tenure and multiple directorships. Furthermore, a sample of Malaysian companies during the period 2005–2011 and the fixed effects panel data method are utilized.

The results suggest that an AC chair with accounting expertise is associated with a reduction in audit delay. The reduction is more obvious when the chair holds shares in the company, but is weakened by longer tenure and multiple directorships. These results are robust after conducting several robust tests. Using mediating analysis, the authors also document that an AC chair with accounting expertise can enhance the timeliness of audit reports even when the quality of financial reporting is lower. The reported result is supported by additional analysis that finds that AC chairs with accounting expertise and AC chairs with accounting expertise and shareholding are significantly associated with shorter abnormal audit delay.

This study provides comprehensive analysis concerning the association between AC chair and audit report timeliness using a unique setting. It is among the limited evidence that reports the moderating effect of AC chair characteristics on the role of such chair on audit report timeliness.

This paper aims to hypothesise that demographic characteristics of managers play a significant role in performing their duties amongst which is financial reporting. This study aims to examine whether CEO characteristics, namely, tenure and financial expertise, are associated with audit report timeliness.

Data from companies listed on the Oman capital market between 2007 and 2011 and three proxies for audit report timeliness are used.

CEO tenure and CEOs with financial expertise are reported to be associated with timely audit reports. Supplementary tests also confirmed this result. In addition, it is suggested and documented that there is an interaction effect between CEO tenure and financial expertise concerning the timeliness of audit reports. The use of a two-stage least square analysis also supported the main results.

Hypotheses were tested using data from Oman with a relatively small sample size. Therefore, only a few characteristics of the CEO were considered and a more sophisticated approach of testing managers’ effect on company policies was unable to be used. In addition, the generalisability of the study findings should be made carefully.

This paper differs from prior studies, in that it extends the audit report timeliness literature by examining whether the CEO tenure and CEOs with financial expertise are associated with audit report timeliness. Findings demonstrate that CEO characteristics are important factors for a timely audit report.

This paper examines the organizational resilience of audit firms during the early stages of COVID-19. The unexpected restrictions placed on travel and on-site working created unanticipated barriers for auditors in Hong Kong. The authors expect that auditors with greater organizational resilience can respond to unexpected situations and restore expected performance levels relatively quickly.

The authors utilize a sample of 1,008 companies listed on Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKEX) with a financial year-end of December 31. The authors identify five proxies contributing to organizational resilience: auditor size, industry specialization, diversity, geographic proximity to the client and auditing a new client. The authors use audit report timeliness as this study's main dependent variable.

This study's full-sample results suggest that larger auditors, industry specialists and auditors with closer relationships to clients issued more timely audit reports during the pandemic. The analysis of a subsample of companies that initially published unaudited financial statements reveals that industry expertise and longer auditor-client relationships significantly reduced the need for year-end audit adjustments. Finally, the authors find that larger auditors were more likely to offload clients, whereas industry specialists were more likely to retain clients.

The results of the paper suggests that audit firm characteristics associated cognitive abilities, behavioral characteristics and contextual conditions are associated with audit firm organizational resilience and, consequently, helps auditors respond unexpected changes in the audit environment.

The findings of the paper are informative for those involved in audit firm management or auditor hiring and retention decisions.

This study is the first to link organizational resilience to the performance of audit firms in a time of unexpected events. The authors connect three auditor and two auditor-client dimensions to the organizational resilience of the audit firms.

Despite extensive research on the determinates of audit report timeliness, there is limited empirical evidence on the effect of auditor locality on audit report timeliness. Therefore, this study aims to examine the relationship between auditor locality and audit report timeliness. Furthermore, this study investigates the moderating roles of audit committee, corporate governance and auditor quality in this relationship.

In this study, the information of 157 companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange during the period 2013–2019 has been collected. Moreover, multivariate linear regressions were used to test the hypotheses.

Findings show that in general, there is no significant relationship between auditor locality and audit report timeliness. However, empirical evidence suggests that in companies with specialized audit committees, strong corporate governance and high-quality auditors, auditor locality improves audit report timeliness.

Overall, the results indicate that there are some circumstances in which auditor locality affects the audit report timeliness. Specifically, the association of auditor locality and audit report timeliness is conditional to audit committee, corporate governance and auditor quality.

The nature of corporate governance (CG) mechanisms in an entity may influence the timeliness of the audited annual report. The purpose of this paper is to argue that the “quality” of CG in a firm has a significant association with the time it takes the audited annual report and financial statements to be released.

Using a set of 543 firm-year observations over the period 2007–2016, the authors examine whether a validated CG-Index is associated with audit report delay (ARD). The authors employ both granular as well as aggregated approaches to the analyses. In addition, the authors include control variables known to have an association with ARD in the panel data regressions.

The findings, which are robust for self-selection among other checks, reveal that financial expertise in the audit committee, board size, board meetings and independence in the board are associated with longer ARDs. Some CG attributes such as board diversity (i.e. women and different nationalities in the board) are associated with improved timeliness of the annual reports. The results also reveal that a longer tenure for independent directors in the board is associated with a shorter ARD. Overall, the authors find that the composite CG score has a positive influence on the timeliness of annual reports.

The study focuses on listed companies in one developing country. Additional studies focusing on other jurisdictions could yield more results.

The study is useful in highlighting those CG characteristics firms should focus on toward the attainment of timely corporate reporting to aid in decision making by users.

The study is unique since it emphasizes the importance of focusing on an aggregate CG-Index, and the contribution of the CG-Index toward the timeliness of annual reports.

The purpose of this study is to examine the extent of audit report lag and its association with governance mechanisms in the Islamic banking institutions in Malaysia.

The extent of audit report lag is defined by the number of days from a company’s financial year-end to the signature date on its audit report. The sample of the study comprises 112 observations of Islamic banking institutions’ financial reports for the period 2008-2014. A balanced panel data analysis is performed to analyse the association between the extent of audit report lag and governance mechanisms.

The findings show that the extent of audit report lag for the sample selected ranges from a minimum period of 7 days to a maximum period of 161 days, and the extent of audit report lag is approximately two months on average. A fixed effects analysis indicates that audit committee expertise and audit committee meeting have significant association with the extent of audit report lag. On the other hand, board independence, audit committee size and Shari’ah board expertise have insignificant association with the extent of audit report lag. In addition, one control variable (Islamic bank size) is found to be significantly associated with longer audit report lag.

The findings provide useful feedback for Malaysian policymakers on the past and current practices of financial reports and of governance mechanisms. The findings of the study would help the policymakers in monitoring the Islamic banking institutions’ compliance with financial reports submission requirements. The policymakers perhaps could relook into governance mechanisms that reduce the extent of audit report lag in the Islamic banking institutions and implement regulations to strengthen them.

Unlike the majority of prior studies that investigated the association between the extent of audit report lag and governance mechanisms, this study provides two contributions. First, to the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first piece of research that examined the association between governance mechanisms and the extent of audit report lag in Islamic banking institutions. Second, the study examined the association of new governance variable, namely, Shari’ah committee expertise which has not been previously examined in the literature of audit report lag.