Do key audit matters matter? Correspondence between auditor and management disclosures and the role of audit committees
研究了国际审计准则ISA 701实施后，审计师披露的关键审计事项与管理层披露的重大会计政策和估计之间的对应关系，并考察了审计委员会如何调节这种关系。对瑞典上市公司样本的分析发现两者正相关，且审计委员会增强了这种关联。
This study examines whether there is a correspondence between auditor disclosures of key audit matters (KAMs) and management disclosures of significant accounting policies and estimates, following the introduction of the International Standard on Auditing (ISA) 701. In addition, we investigate how audit committees moderate the relationship. We employ a sample of Swedish listed firms (2016–2018), using measures that capture the extent and quality of management disclosures and how they relate to auditor KAM disclosures, including the number of accounting items disclosed, total number of words, and number of unique KAM-related words (via a “bag-of-word” technique). We find a positive correspondence between auditor and management disclosures, and the correlation is greater in firms with an audit committee. Additional analyses provide evidence that management disclosure quality increases after the introduction of ISA 701, but the positive effect is mostly found in firms with a separate audit committee on the board. The results are robust to alternative measures for disclosures and using a matched sample design. Our findings suggest that policymakers should consider the interplay between audit standards and audit committees.