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BIG4 or Non-BIG4 Auditors: Their Impact on Audit Quality during the Global Financial Crisis
School of Social Sciences, Hellenic Open University, Patras, Greece
School of Social Sciences, Hellenic Open University, Patras, Greece
- 1 School of Social Sciences, Hellenic Open University, Patras, Greece
- 2 School of Social Sciences, Hellenic Open University, Patras, Greece
Theoretical Economics Letters·Volume 08 (2018)·Pages 909–917·Published 19 March 2018·DOI10.4236/tel.2018.85064
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Abstract
The objective of this paper is to examine the relationship between auditor tenure and discretionary accruals as a proxy of audit quality. The main finding is that this relationship was found to be negative for BIG4 and n on-BIG4 auditors in crisis and non-crisis periods, for both German and French companies. In addition, Italian and Spanish companies seem to interplay in crisis and non-crisis periods being either negative or not for BIG4 and non-BIG4 auditors. The findings imply that the larger the country , the better the audit quality and this seems to be confirmed by graphs and statistically by the one-sample T-test.
KeywordsBIG4Non-BIG4Auditor TenureAudit QualityFinancial CrisisGDP
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