Are Capitalized Software Development Costs Informative About Audit Risk?
Gopal V. KrishnanChangjiang (John) Wang
Gopal V. Krishnan is a Professor at American University, and Changjiang (John) Wang is an Assistant Professor at Florida International University.
Corresponding author: Gopal V. Krishnan. Email: krishnan@american.edu
We appreciate the helpful comments and suggestions from Arnold M. Wright (editor), two anonymous reviewers, and seminar participants at American University, The University of Texas at Arlington, and the 2012 AAA Annual Meeting.
SYNOPSIS
Capitalization of software research and development costs (SDC) under SFAS No. 86 is the only exception to SFAS No. 2 that calls for immediate expensing of R&D costs. Although intangible assets have become increasingly relevant for firm valuation, they remain largely unexplored in audit research. This is an important topic because intangible assets, especially those that are internally developed, pose greater challenges in assessing audit risk relative to tangible assets. Capitalization of SDC offers a unique opportunity to study how auditors assess audit risk associated with the recognition of this intangible asset. While capitalized SDC could shed light on software products' potential commercial success and inform the auditor about the client's business risk, the accounting flexibility allowed by SFAS No. 86 also increases the risk of earnings management, and thus implies higher audit risk. Using audit fees as a proxy for audit risk, our results indicate that capitalized SDC are negatively associated with audit fees for firms where capitalization is inconsequential to beating analysts' forecasts, and also for firms with low analysts' following. These results support the notion that capitalized SDC signal lower business risk, especially for firms with low earnings management risk or high private information.
The Global Financial Crisis: U.S. Bankruptcies and Going-Concern Audit Opinions
Marshall A. GeigerK. RaghunandanWilliam Riccardi
Marshall A. Geiger is a Professor at the University of Richmond; K. Raghunandan is a Professor and William Riccardi is a Ph.D. Student, both at Florida International University.
Corresponding author: K. Raghunandan. Email: raghu@fiu.edu
We thank two anonymous reviewers and the editor for their many helpful comments on earlier versions of this paper.
SYNOPSIS
This study investigates whether auditors' going-concern modified opinion (GCO) decisions were less likely after the start of the recent “Global Financial Crisis” (GFC). Auditing regulators and the business press had complained that auditors did not provide adequate warning in their reports prior to many companies filing for bankruptcy during the GFC. Accordingly, we examine auditors' GCO opinions for financially stressed clients that subsequently entered into bankruptcy during the period from 2004 to 2010. We find that, after controlling for other factors related to GCOs, the propensity of auditors to issue a GCO prior to bankruptcy significantly increased after the onset of the GFC. Additional tests reveal similar results when we separately examine clients of the Big 4 and non-Big 4 firms, suggesting both sized firms significantly increased the likelihood of issuing a GCO to a subsequently bankrupt client after the start of the GFC. Our results should be of interest to regulators, investors, audit firms, academics, and standard setters as they evaluate U.S. auditor performance during the GFC, and in contemplation of changes to auditing standards as a result of the GFC.