SUMMARY We examine whether firms undertaking an initial public offering (IPO) exhibit less earnings management when individual investment bankers have prior experience in public accounting. Although auditors are primarily responsible for providing external monitoring of the financial reporting process, individual bankers also have strong incentives to improve accounting quality in firms going public. We predict a negative relation between public accounting experience and IPO firms’ earnings management because working in public practice fosters individual bankers’ accounting expertise and conservative personalities. In exploiting unique disclosures of investment bankers’ identities and characteristics in China, our analysis indicates that bankers with early-career public accounting experience constrain IPO firms’ accrual-based earnings management. Consistent with expectations, we find that this evidence is more pronounced if the accounting firm that employed the future investment banker is larger, is permitted to audit listed companies, and was previously subject to a regulatory sanction. Data Availability: Most data are publicly available from the sources identified in the paper. Hand-collected data from the Securities Association of China (SAC) can be made available upon request. JEL Classifications: G24; M41; M42.

SUMMARY We experimentally demonstrate that perspective taking improves the auditor performance evaluation process by mitigating the outcome effect and increasing evaluator focus on decision process quality. In a common setting in which a staff auditor exhibits appropriate skeptical behavior that correctly identifies no misstatement, supervising auditors prompted to take the perspective of the staff auditor evaluate the staff’s performance more highly than unprompted auditors—performance ratings that align with ratings provided to auditors who detect a misstatement. Results indicate that perspective taking mitigates the outcome effect by increasing supervisor attention to information cues about the staff’s decision process quality and away from cues about the nondiagnostic misstatement outcome. We also show that perspective taking increases evaluator consensus and reduces the variance in evaluator ratings that often plague performance reviews. Overall, our findings suggest that perspective taking can improve attention to process quality and help align reward structures with desired auditor behavior. JEL Classifications: M40; M42.

SUMMARY We examine auditor communication provisions (ACPs) in private loan agreements, which are private contracting mechanisms establishing communication between lenders and their borrowers’ auditors. We provide evidence that lenders value auditor communications and often specify different types of ACPs that facilitate lender monitoring. With predictable variation across the different ACP types, ACPs are associated with larger loans, longer maturities, larger loan syndicates, more financial covenants, and greater slack in financial covenants. In examining audit effort implications for borrowers, we find that ACPs are associated with higher audit fees and longer audit report lags. This is consistent with auditors responding to the litigation risk ACPs impose. In samples where the risk of third-party litigation is greater, the association between ACPs and audit effort proxies is heightened, suggesting the increased litigation risk brought about by ACPs interacts with other audit client-specific risk factors. Data Availability: Data are available from the public sources cited in the text. JEL Classifications: M42; D82; G21; G30; K40.

SUMMARY Ego depletion, an influential social psychology theory that has been applied in auditing research, is currently in crisis following unsuccessful attempts to replicate the phenomenon. I summarize the questions surrounding ego depletion as a phenomenon and the strength model of self-control as its theoretical explanation. Existing evidence suggests that depletion is a real phenomenon but that its effect is likely overstated in prior literature. However, it seems that the strength model is not the best theoretical explanation for depletion. To provide a path forward to continue investigating this phenomenon, I describe four alternative theories from prior literature. Highlighting motivation as a common thread in these theories, I then propose a new theory that views ego depletion as transient cognitive fatigue. Finally, I discuss opportunities for future research in auditing, best practices for the design of these studies, and meta-lessons that accounting researchers can take from crises in psychology research.

SUMMARY The valuation allowance for deferred tax assets is an audited disclosure that reflects management’s expectations regarding the future profitability of a company. Building on prior literature that establishes this disclosure as an indicator of future distress, we examine whether the valuation allowance is associated with auditors’ going concern evaluations. We find evidence that the existence and magnitude of the valuation allowance, as well as changes in the allowance, are positively associated with the likelihood that a company receives a first-time going concern opinion. We also find some evidence that valuation allowances are associated with reduced Type I and Type II going concern opinion misclassifications. Our results suggest that the information related to management’s plans and expectations that is reflected in the valuation allowance is incrementally relevant to auditors in their assessment of a company’s likelihood of failure. Data Availability: Data are available from the public sources cited in the text.

SUMMARY Independent assurance of extended external reports (EER) is one of the most significant trends in today’s global assurance profession. When companies decide to purchase third-party assurance on EER, they need to decide whether to engage their financial statement auditor or a different assurance provider. We examine factors that impact this decision, and the consequences of this decision on financial statement audit quality and cost. We find that independence concerns are associated with companies choosing different EER assurance providers from their incumbent financial statement auditors, while providers’ expertise in EER assurance and the recent trend of integrating nonfinancial information into the annual report promote the use of the same provider. We further find some evidence that companies with the same provider attesting to both financial statements and EER benefit from having higher financial statement audit quality without paying significantly different audit fees.

SUMMARY Using unique Australian data, we first identify the determinants of the provision of pro bono audits to charities and examine their consequential audit quality. This advances our knowledge about how often and why auditors volunteer their services, and whether quality concerns are realized. Then, for non-pro bono audits, we calculate abnormal audit fees and examine their impact on audit quality. We find that pro bono audits are mainly supplied by Big 4 auditors to charities with greater public donations, a lower debt ratio, and operating in multiple locations. We are unable to identify evidence of impaired audit quality when comparing pro bono audits with non-pro bono audits. For non-pro bono audits, audit fees are significantly associated with size, complexity, and revenue sources, with premiums paid to larger audit firms. We find evidence consistent with reduced audit quality associated with negative abnormal audit fees for non-Big 4 audits.

SUMMARY We use proprietary archival data to examine one annually inspected audit firm's experience with the PCAOB inspection process. We find that the firm's audits are primarily selected for inspection due to client characteristics, while deficiencies identified by inspectors are related to characteristics of both the client and the audit team. We also find that not all identified audit deficiencies are reported to the public. However, we find some evidence that only publicly disclosed deficiencies are associated with ex post measures of audit quality, suggesting that the PCAOB releases only the most relevant and material information to the public. Finally, we find that inspections affect the concurrent year's audit team staffing decisions and reduce the proportion of the audit that is completed during the interim period. Overall, our study provides important insights into the PCAOB inspection process while also developing and validating a model of inspection risk for future researchers.