會計師事務所組織型態與審計品質：來自中國證據

Auditors' Organizational Form and Audit Quality: Evidence from China

中國於1994年開始實施中華人民共和國註冊會計師法，該法規規定註冊會計師可以選擇申請設立合夥（partnership）會計師事務所或有限責任的法人型態的事務所。由於這兩類組織型態的事務所會計師所面臨的法律環境不同，因此本研究主要在探討合夥事務所所屬會計師，審計品質是否與有限責任事務所所屬的會計師有差別，本研究援引2000至2014年在中國深圳及上海交易所掛牌上市發行A股之的公司作為研究樣本，並以裁決性應計盈餘大小與會計師事務所是否發佈無保留意見，作為審計品質之代理變數。實證結果發現，自從中國會計師法實行以來，為降低法律責任，註冊會計師多偏好選擇有限責任的事務所組織型態。進一步研究顯示，由於合夥會計師事務所所屬的會計師負有無限清償責任，相對的，有限責任事務所所屬的會計師僅負有有限的清償責任，因而合夥組織型態的會計師事務所，其所屬的會計師審計品質優於有限責任事務所所屬的會計師。 Audit firms in China have been given option to choose legal forms, partnership or limited liability (LLP) depending on their organizations since 1994. Different from LLC with limitation of partnership liability, each partner is liable for all the audit services, which raise an incentive for individual partner to monitor the audit quality provided by their fellow partners in the partnership structure. It hypothesizes that auditor independence is lower for legal structure of LLP than for legal forms of partnership. This study uses discretionary accrual (therefore DA) and the likelihood of auditor firms issuing clean opinion as proxies for audit quality, respectively. Using a sample of listed firms in China, this study finds that auditees of audit firms adopting legal forms of partnership report higher the levels of both the income-increasing DA and the absolute DA, compared to clients of audit firms adopting LLP legal forms. This study also finds that the likelihood of issuing unqualified opinion is higher for partner of general partnership relative to one of LLP.