Do big auditors and non-big auditors have differences in audit quality？-Considering self-selection problem

• Main Authors: Yi-Ling Chen, 陳怡伶
• Other Authors: Yue-duan Guan
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2012
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/gy386j

碩士 === 銘傳大學 === 會計學系碩士班 === 100 === This study aims to explore whether big auditors and non-big auditors have differences in audit quality after considering the self-selection problem. This study is based on the sample of 10674 listed companies and 2205 unlisted public companies observations from 2002 to 2010. For the listed companies, the empirical results show that the discretionary accruals of big auditors’ clients are not different from those of non-big auditors’ clients before or after controlling for self-selection problem. The findings indicate that big auditors do not constrain clients’ earnings management more effectively than non-big auditors. In contrast, for unlisted public companies, the evidence shows that the discretionary accruals of big auditors’ clients are bigger than those of non-big auditors’ clients after using propensity-scores matching method to control for self-selection problem, which suggests that possible reference bias may occur when examining audit quality between big auditors and non-big auditors without controlling for self-selection problem.