경영자 능력이 초도감사보수에 미치는 영향

The Effect of Managerial Ability on Initial Audit Engagement Discount

본 연구는 경영자 능력이 초도감사보수에 미치는 영향을 분석한다. 구체적으로 경영자 능력이 높을수록 초도감사보수가 낮아지는지를 실증검증 함으로써 경영자 능력이 초도감사보수 할인에 영향을 미치는 요인인지를 확인하고자 한다. 분석결과 경영자 능력이 높을수록 초도감사보수는 낮은 것으로 나타났다. 이는 능력 있는 경영자일수록 다양한 측면에서 감사위험이 낮음을 고려할 때 감사인의 높은 수요가 감사보수 경쟁으로 이어져 초도감사보수가 할인되는 것으로 해석된다. 추가적으로 경영자 능력은 초도감사품질과는 유의한 관련성을 갖지 않는 것으로 나타났다. 이는 앞서 경영자 능력과 초도감사보수 간의 유의한 음(-)의 관련성을 고려할 때 경영자 능력에 대한 초도감사보수 할인이 감사품질을 훼손시키지는 않음을 의미한다. 본 연구결과는 적정 감사보수 기준 등의 수립과정에서 경영자 능력도 중요하게 고려되어야 함을 강조하고 있어 감사환경을 둘러싼 다양한 규제기관들의 논의에 도움을 줄 것으로 기대된다.

This study analyzes the effect of managerial ability on initial audit fees. Specifically, we try to verify whether the manager’s ability is a factor affecting audit fees discount by examining whether the manager’s ability lowers the initial audit fees. Managerial ability is an important factor in determining the operation of the firm. The higher managerial ability results in better performance (Demerjian et al. 2012; Ko et al. 2013), greater financial reporting quality (Demerjian et al. 2013; Lee et al. 2015), and the weaker negative effect of tax avoidance on firm value (Park et al. 2016). This implies that managerial ability not only affects firm performance through efficient allocation of resources but also has a significant influence on estimation and judgment related to accounting treatment. In addition to this, Krishnan and Wang (2015) show that higher managerial competence decreases the risk of corporate failure, leading to lower audit fees. Cho et al. (2016) provide evidence that managerial ability also affects the preparation of pre-audit financial statements. In sum, there is an influence of managerial ability in the aspect of auditing. The results of previous studies indicate that audit risk for firms with higher managerial ability is relatively low. Audit risk is a very important factor in the decision making process of auditors, so it can be expected that there will be a high audit demand for firms with competent managers (Krishnan and Krishnan 1997). This high demand is combined with the intense competition of the audit market, which is likely that managerial ability plays a role in lowering initial audit fees. However, competent managers have incentives to improve accounting information quality through high-quality audit service. It is possible that there is no association between managerial ability and initial audit fees. Considering these contrasting influences, it is difficult to predict the effect of managerial ability on initial audit fees. Thus, in this study, we empirically investigate whether managerial ability is related to initial audit engagement discount. Using 15,404 firm-years from 2003 to 2015, this study finds that the higher the managerial ability, the lower the initial audit fees. This suggests that greater demand for firms with higher ability managers lead to more competition among auditors, resulting in lower initial audit fees. Additionally, empirical results show that manager’s ability has no association with initial audit quality, indicating that lower initial audit fees of more competent managers does not negatively affect audit quality. Additional analysis considering the type of auditor change shows that the main results are maintained only in the change within non-Big auditors. In addition, competent managers are likely to change auditors to Big N, confirming that they consider audit quality to be important in an audit contract. This study extends the literature by showing that managerial ability is an important factor affecting initial audit fees. This study additionally shows that initial audit fees discount does not necessarily lead to the audit quality deterioration, suggesting that the uniform regulation on initial audit fees, which does not consider audit demand, may reduce social welfare. This study also emphasizes the importance of managerial competency concerning financial statements preparation by providing evidence that it can contributes to decrease external audit fees.