会计师事务所声誉损失与业绩预告质量——基于监管处罚的经验证据

《外国经济与管理》 2022年44卷第3期 页码：88 - 102  online：2022年3月15日

会计师事务所声誉损失与业绩预告质量——基于监管处罚的经验证据

Reputation Loss of Accounting Firms and Quality of Earnings Forecast: Evidence from Regulator Sanction

作者（中）：毛志宏, 李燕, 金龙

作者（英）：Mao Zhihong, Li Yan, Jin Long

作者单位：1.吉林大学 商学院，吉林 长春 130012

摘要：以2007—2019年沪深A股上市公司为样本，采用会计师事务所被监管层处罚作为会计师事务所声誉损失的外生事件，考察了会计师事务所声誉损失对上市公司业绩预告质量的影响。研究发现，会计师事务所声誉损失后，上市公司业绩预告质量显著提升，这说明上市公司会通过提高业绩预告质量，以挽回会计师事务所声誉损失给其带来的负面影响。进一步研究发现，当公司内外部治理水平较高、对信息披露质量较重视以及会计师事务所声誉受损较严重时，会计师事务所声誉损失导致上市公司业绩预告质量的提升更为明显。本文的研究结论不仅丰富了业绩预告质量影响因素和会计师事务所声誉损失经济后果的相关文献，也为建立健全声誉评价机制、加强对中介机构的监管提供了政策依据。

关键词：会计师事务所; 声誉损失; 监管处罚; 业绩预告质量

Summary: With the implementation of the registration system, the government has decentralized and the responsibility for information disclosure in the process of listing has transferred more to issuers and financial intermediaries, which makes investors rely more on intermediaries. As the final “gatekeeper” of the accounting information quality of listed companies, the reputation of accounting firms is very important. However, in recent years, the occurrence of financial fraud in some domestic listed companies has caused accounting firms to be severely punished by regulatory authorities, and caused serious damage to their reputation. Companies choose accounting firms with good reputation to eliminate investors’ doubts about accounting information, and they can also disclose more accurate earnings forecast to build their reputation and eliminate information asymmetry. Therefore, listed companies are able to reduce the impact due to the reputation loss of accounting firms by improving the quality of earnings forecast.Based on the background, this paper examines whether listed companies redeem the negative impact of the reputation loss of accounting firms on their companies by improving the quality of earnings forecast, using a sample of A-share listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen from 2007 to 2019 and the punishment of accounting firms by the regulator as an exogenous event of their reputation loss. The study finds that companies significantly improve the quality of earnings forecasts after the reputation loss of accounting firms, and this finding still holds after a series of robustness tests. Further, it is found that companies improve the quality of earnings forecast more significantly after the reputation loss of accounting firms when the level of internal and external governance is higher, when information asymmetry is more important, and when the damage to the reputation of accounting firms is more severe.The contributions of this paper are as follows: （1） Previous literature has mainly studied the consequences of the reputation loss of accounting firms due to regulatory penalties from the perspectives of the passing of audit committees, the deterrent effect on auditors, and client loss. This paper innovatively examines whether companies value the assurance provided by the reputation of accounting firms from the perspective of company disclosure, extending the research related to the reputation loss of accounting firms. （2） This paper verifies that earnings forecast is an important tool for managers to manage information disclosure, and managers proactively uses earnings forecast to reduce information asymmetry when the external environment changes. （3） The findings of this paper have strong practical implications. By examining whether companies react to the damage of intermediaries’ reputation, we can understand the importance of intermediaries’ reputation in the capital market and the extent to which companies rely on intermediaries’ reputation, which provides an important theoretical basis for the regulatory issues in the implementation of the registration system. That is, we can rely less on administrative control and more on the market-based reputation mechanism to restrain intermediaries and protect investors.

Key words: accounting firms; reputation loss; regulator sanction; quality of earnings forecast

DOI：10.16538/j.cnki.fem.20210831.202

收稿日期：2021-8-2

基金项目：2021年吉林大学廉政建设专项研究课题（2021LZY003）

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