감사인 특성이 감사보고오류에 미치는 영향

김정교 ( Jeong Kyo Kim ),신찬휴(교신저자) ( Chan Hyu Shin ) 한국회계학회 2016 회계저널 Vol.25 No.3

주식이 거래대상으로서의 적격성이 결여되어 상장폐지 되면 주가가 급락하여 투자손실이 발생할 수 있으므로, 투자자는 상장폐지로 인한 투자손실을 회피하기 위해서 상장폐지 가능성을 사전에 면밀하게 검토할 필요가 있다. 피감사기업의 계속기업 존속능력에 대한 중요한 불확실성이 존재하면, 감사인은 감사보고서에 계속기업불확실성을 표명할 수 있다. 계속기업 존속능력에 대한 평가가 틀리면 손실을 입은 투자자는 감사보고오류를 근거로 감사인에게 소송이 제기될 수 있으며, 법리적 다툼은 감사과정에서 감사인이 전문가로서의 정당한 주의를 기울였는가가 관건이 된다. 감사인의 무과실에 대한 입증책임은 감사인에게 귀속되므로 소송으로 인한 비용 발생이나 명성 하락을 방지하기 위해서 감사인은 소송을 회피할 필요가 있다. 이를 위하여 감사인은 감사보고 정확성을 향상시킬 동기를 가진다. 계속기업 존속능력에 대한 평가의 유용성을 강화하기 위해서는 감사보고오류의 발생가능성에 영향을 미치는 특성을 파악할 필요가 있다. 본 연구에서는 첫째, 감사인의 계속기업불확실성 표명 여부와 상장폐지 간의 관계를 검증한다. 둘째, 감사보고오류의 발생에 영향을 미치는 감사인 특성을 검증한다. 분석 결과 첫째, 감사인의 계속기업불확실성 표명 여부와 상장폐지는 유의적인 양(+)의 관계를 가진다. 둘째, Type Ⅰ error와 감사인 규모와는 유의적인 양(+)의 관계, 비정상 감사시간과는 유의적인 음(-)의 관계를 가진다. 셋째, Type Ⅱ error는 비정상 감사보수 간에 유의적인양(+)의 관계가 나타났다. 본 연구의 공헌점은 다음과 같다. 첫째, 계속기업불확실성 표명 여부가 상장폐지를 예측할수 있다는 시장의 신념에 대한 실증적 증거를 제시했다. 둘째, 투자자의 감사보고서 신뢰성을 평가에 있어서 보완적 정보로 활용할 수 있는 감사인 특성을 검증하였다. 셋째, 회계감리 대상기업의 선정에 있어 감사보고오류 발생가능성이 높은 기업에 관한 추가적인 정보를 제공한다. The Exchange shall delist the common stocks in case where a company that has listed its common stocks comes under any of delisitng items. If stocks of the company are delisted, stock price will be rapidly decreased and investors are going to get enormous losses. Accordingly, investors have been concerning whether the company that they have invested will be out in the market in the near future. Auditors have a duty to evaluate management’s assessment of the client’s ability to continue as a going concern and could cast significant doubt on the client’s ability to continue as a going concern when there are material uncertainties. The FSS(Financial Security Services) reports that many delisting companies have a doubt on the ability to continue as a going concern on the audit report prior to delist and suggests that investors have to concern a going concern uncertainty. We examine the relation between the going concern uncertainty and the delisting to confirm a belief that the going concern uncertainty can be a useful information to predict companies to be delisted. Are there any motives to predict the client’s ability to contines as a going concern from auditors position? They don’t have a duty to predict the ability to continue as going concern in principle. However, they can be sued for errors of audit reporting from investors who had losses by delisitng the company they had audited, and then it is matter whether they had carried out an audit as professionals who had a trust and good faith, not the audit reporting was correct. If they are sued, they can get losses which are lawsuit costs, human resources outflows or reputation demage. Therefore, they want to avoid lawsuits by investors and they have had motives to increase accuracy to evaluate a client’s ability to continue as going concern. If investors know what audit characteristics are related with accuracy of audit reporting, they can reduce investment losses from delisting. At the first, we examine a relation between the going concern uncertainty and the delisting to confirm that the belief on the market for the going concern uncertainty is rational. Next, we classify audit reporting error as Type Ⅰ error and Type Ⅱ error and examine what characteristics of auditors are related with a probability to occur Type Ⅰ error and Type Ⅱ error. Results are below. First, there is a positive relation between the going concern uncertainty and the delisted company, and this result can be a clue for a belief on the market that going concern uncertainty is useful information to predict which company will be delisted in the near future. Second, Type Ⅰ error has a positive relation with big 4 auditors and a negative relation with the abnormal audit hours. These results can be interpreted as big 4 auditors are more conservative and the abnormal audit hours can mitigate probability to occur Type Ⅰ error. Third, there is a positive relation between Type Ⅱ error and abnormal audit fees, and this result can be interpreted as auditors who are taken much abnormal audit fees are less conservative. Contributions of this study are below. First, we confirm a belief on the market that the going concern opinion is useful information to predict companies to be delisted in the near future. Second, we confirm what characteristics of auditors, financial states and stock price are related with audit reporting errors, so these clues can be useful to evaluate a faithfulness of audit reporting to review the client’s ability to continue as going concern business. Third, results of this study give information about the probability of delisting, these can help authorities to decide to choice companies to do the audit review.

연구논문 : 자산손상차손 인식기업의 이익지속성과 자본시장의 반응: 재량적 자산손상차손 인식을 중심으로

김혜리(제1저자) ( Hye Ri Kim ),김정교(교신저자) ( Jeong Kyo Kim ) 한국회계학회 2015 회계저널 Vol.24 No.6

본 연구의 목적은 특별항목 중 구체적인 회계규정의 미비 때문에 경영자의 재량적이익관리수단으로 널리 이용되고 있다고 비판 받고 있는 자산손상차손을 이용하여 손상차손 인식기업의 이익지속성과 자본시장 반응에 대해 조사하는 것이다. 분석결과는 다음과 같다. 첫째, 자산손상을 인식한 기업은 미인식기업보다 재량적 발생액부분에서 낮은 이익지속성이 나타났다. 또한 재량적 손상차손의 지속성은 비재량적 손상차손의 지속성에 비해 낮음을 보였다. 둘째, Mishkin(1983) test를 이용하여 지속성의 자본시장 반응을 분석한 결과, 자본시장은 자산손상 미인식기업의 발생액 구성요소에 비해자산손상 인식기업의 이익구성요소의 지속성을 합리적으로 평가하지 못하는 것으로 나타났다. 또한 자본시장은 비재량적 손상차손에 비해 재량적 손상차손의 지속성을 합리적으로 평가하지 못하는 것으로 나타났다. 셋째, 총 표본을 차기 손상차손 인식 전 이익기업과 손실기업으로 나누어 분석한 검증결과는 대부분 차기 손상차손 인식 전 이익기업에서만 유의한 결과를 나타냈다. 넷째, 재량적 자산손상차손의 측정에 대한 강건성 분석 결과 주분석의 결과와 동일하게 나타나 재량적 자산손상차손이 발생액 이상 현상을 유발하는 요소라는 추가적인 증거를 제시한다. 본 연구는 재량적 자산손상차손의 측정과정과 관련하여 누락변수 문제, 측정오차 등과 같은 한계가 존재하지만 경제요인과 기업성과요인 외에 재량적으로 인식되는 손상차손 부분을 분리하였다는 점에서 기존 손상차손 연구와 차별성을 가진다. 또한 특별항목 중 실제회계기준의 미비점이 존재한다고 지적 받고 있는 자산손상차손을 인식한 기업의 이익지속성과 자본시장 반응을 검증하였다는 점에서 기존 손상차손연구에 공헌점을 가진다. Prior capital market accounting studies reporting accrual anomaly explain that partial market participants afford to get abnormal return as capital market does not rationally evaluate the information toward current earning components containing future earning information(Bernard and Thomas 1990; Sloan 1996; Xie 2001). Especially, Sloan(1996) reports that the persistence of total accruals for future earnings is lower than that of cash flows, and he suggest that the overpricing of total accruals due largely to discretional accruals(Sloan 1996, Xie 2001). Also, Richardson et al.(2005) suggested that less reliable accruals lead to lower earnings persistence and investors do not rationally reflect lower earnings persistence, leading to significant stock mispricing. So, accrual anomaly is occurred on account of the less reliable accruals information that being provided to market participants. Until now capital market pricing studies have focused on operating accruals, but Dechow and Ge(2006) argue that high accruals are likely to be the outcome of rules with an income statement perspective, while low accruals are likely to be the outcome of rules with a balance sheet perspective, and that this has implications for the properties of earnings. The low persistence of earnings in low accrual firms is primarily driven by special items. They then show that low accrual firms of possessing special item have higher future stock returns than other low accrual firms. This is consistent with investors misunderstanding the transitory nature of special items. Similarly, Kang and Choi(2009) insist on that operating accruals not only cause low earning persistence and capital market pricing, but also non-operating accruals cause low earning persistence and capital market pricing. This paper investigates the persistence and market pricing of the firms recognized asset impairments using the asset impairment among special items that has been criticized for being used as a means to discretional earnings management of managers owing to accounting regulation``s imperfections of asset impairments. To sum up prior studies, the low persistence of discretional accruals can is caused through special items into discretional accruals and the special items of having less reliability act as a main component of accrual anomaly. The results are as follows. First, the persistence of the firms recognized asset impairments is lower than that of the firms unrecognized asset impairments. Also, the persistence of discretional asset impairments is lower than that of non-discretional asset impairments. Second, using Mishkin(1983) test, the market pricing results indicate that capital market does not more rationally evaluate the persistence of earnings components of the firms recognized asset impairments than that of the firms unrecognized asset impairments. Also, capital market does not more rationally evaluate the persistence of discretional asset impairments than that of non-discretional asset impairments. Third, We separated samples as pre-impairment profit firms during the next year and pre-impairment loss firms during the next year. The results on analyzing separated samples were significantly indicated in almost profit firms during the next year. Fourth, we additionally robust tested discretional asset impairments variable about Heckman 2 stage estimate using methodology of Bushway et al.(2007) and Lennox et al.(2012). That results same about main analysis. This paper has limitation such as the omitted variable problem, the measurement error as regards the measurement process of discretional asset impairments but has differentiation as compared with prior studies which we separate discretional asset impairments from economic factors and real Firm performance factors. Also, based on that the asset impairment among special items has accounting regulation``s imperfections, this paper contribute to prior studies on investigating the persistence and market pricing of the firms recognized asset impairments.