This paper explores the effects of the ratification of Statement on Auditing Standards (hereafter, SAS) No. 33 and the amendment of SAS No. 16 in 1999 on the auditors' decisions regarding issuing a going concern opinion. Both SAS No. 2 and the original SAS No. 16 require that, when there is a major concern about the ”going concern” assumption with respect to the auditee, the auditors have to issue a qualified opinion or a disclaimer even though the auditee had already made proper disclosures in the financial statements. However, in accordance with SAS No. 33 and the revised SAS No. 16, the auditors should issue a modified unqualified audit opinion instead.
The major function of the financial statements is to help the users to make knowledgeable decisions. The audit performed by the auditors and its product-the audit opinions on whether the financial statements are fairly presented according to the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP)-can be the base for a user to properly assess the reliability of the financial statements. Previous literature has shown that opinion shopping is prevalent among the auditees (e.g., Chow and Rice, 1982; Schwartz and Menon, 1985; Smith, 1986; Gul et al., 1992; Lennox, 2000). It is possible that the auditors' intention to retain their clients and the pressure wielded by the clients can force the auditors to issue an improperly unqualified report (Kida, 1980; Chen, 1998). It is therefore important to enhance the degree of independence of the auditors. However, when dealing with the topic of maintaining or enhancing auditor independence, extant research almost always focuses on the design of auditors' legal liability and liability regime, the necessity of mandatory auditor rotation or the prohibition of provision of non-audit services, and the importance of corporate governance (e.g., DeFond et al., 2002; Carcello and Neal, 2000, 2003; Myers et al., 2003; Lee, Hsu, and Chen, 2003), and usually ignores the possibility that auditing standards can also affect auditor independence.
Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to analyze the effects of augmenting the types of the audit reports that an auditor can issue as promulgated in SAS No. 33 on an auditor's audit opinion decisions. In addition to the change in the types and forms of audit reports, does the implementation of SAS No. 33 also affect the auditors' decision on whether to issue a going concern opinion and hence have real influence? In other words, this paper intends to investigate whether the change of the audit report type from a qualified opinion or a disclaimer to a modified unqualified opinion when there is a major concern about the ”going concern” assumption with respect to the auditee would tend to increase the chances for an auditor to issue going concern opinions as the pressure from the clients are lessened.
Data from 1995 to 1998 (1999 to 2002) are used for pre- (post-) SAS No. 33 period. The final sample contained 1,556 and 3,187 companies from the pre- and post-SAS No. 33 periods. Of the 1,556 companies in the pre-SAS No. 33 period, 1.5% received a going-concern opinion. Of the 3,187 companies in the post-SAS No. 33 period, 4.5% received a going-concern opinion. The result indicate that, after the SAS No. 33 became effective, auditors are significantly more likely to issue going-concern opinions. Such finding persists after controlling client size, financial statement variable, and prior period opinion. Therefore, the finding suggests that well designed auditing standards can be used as an instrument to enhance auditor independence. In addition, the magnitude of the effect on the Big 5 firms is smaller than that on the non-Big 5 firms, although the difference is insignificant.
