earticle

영어

This paper empirically analyzes the effect of audit governance, internal specialists of accounting practice/disclosure and audit quality on recognition for estimated liabilities. According to prior research, audit governance, internal specialists of accounting practice/disclosure and audit quality may generally exert more effort on enhancing the transparency of accounting information and conservative accounting process. If they can perform more conservative and transparency accounting procedures in recognition of estimated liabilities, the recognition of estimated liabilities can be affected by audit governance, internal specialists of accounting practice/disclosure and audit quality. The sample selection procedure is summarized as follows; Our initial sample consists of 2,939 observations (firm-year) available on TS 2000 belonging to manufacturing industry with December fiscal years listed on the Korea Stock Exchange from 2004 to 2008. From these total observations, we exclude the missing financial data. We also delete the outlier of dependent and independent variable to mitigate the effects of extreme observations. Finally, the sample consists of non-banking firms (2,486 firm-years) with december fiscal year. Among total sample, 847 firm-year observations are those who report the recognition of estimated liabilities and the remaining 1,639 firm-year observations are those who report no estimated liabilities. And 451 firm-year observations are those who have the Certified Public Accountant (CPA) as the internal specialists of accounting practice and the remaining 2,035 firm-year observations are those who have no CPA. Also, 1,667 firm-year observations are those who are audited by larger auditors such as Big4 auditors that are assumed to provide high-quality audit services and the remaining 819 firm-year observations are those who are not audited by larger auditors such as Big4 auditors. Empirical findings are summarized as follows: First, consistent with the prediction, there is significant positive association between the recognition of estimated liabilities and the possession of internal specialists of accounting practice and disclosure. But there is no significant positive association between the amount of estimated liabilities and the possession of internal specialists of accounting practice and disclosure. This shows that firms report the recognition of estimated liabilities when they have the internal specialists of accounting practice and disclosure such as Certified Public Accountant that are assumed to provide the conservative accounting process. Second, there is significant positive association between the recognition of estimated liabilities and audit governance, audit quality. Also high audit governance and high quality audits are positively related to the amount of estimated liabilities. This result indicates that firms report the estimated liabilities when they are high audit governance and audited by larger auditors such as Big4 auditors that are assumed to provide high-quality audit services. These results show that audit governance, internal specialists of accounting practice/disclosure and audit quality can have an important effect on the recognition for estimated liabilities. So policy makers and firms need to pay more attention to clarify transparent criterion in recognition of estimated liabilities. Also standard-setters need to enhance overall the audit governance, internal specialists of accounting practice/disclosure and audit quality to improve the usefulness of accounting information.

한국어

충당부채의 인식과정에는 경제적 효익이 내재된 자원의 미래 유출가능성과 당해 의무의 이행에 소요되는 금액을 신뢰성 있게 추정하는 절차가 요구되므로 상대적으로 기업의 재량적인 판단이 개입될 가능성이 매우 높은 항목이다. 본 연구는 이러한 충당부채의 인식유인에 감사기구관련 지배구조, 외부감사품질 및 내부회계․공시전문인력의 보유가 미치는 영향에 대해 실증적으로 분석하였다. 2004년부터 2008년까지 12월 결산기업 중 금융업종에 속하지 않은 상장기업 2,486개를 대상으로 분석한 결과 감사기구관련 지배구조가 우수한 기업일수록, 상대적으로 감사품질이 높을 것으로 기대되는 대형 회계법인으로부터 감사를 받은 기업일수록 충당부채의 인식유인이 유의하게 높은 것으로 나타났다. 또한 내부회계․공시전문인력을 보유한 기업일수록 충당부채의 인식유인이 유의하게 높은 것으로 나타났다. 이러한 분석결과는 재량적이고 전문적인 판단이 요구되는 충당부채의 인식문제에 상대적으로 보수적인 회계처리정책과 투명한 공시정책을 유지할 수 있는 감사기구관련 지배구조와 외부감사인의 품질 및 내부회계․공시전문인력의 보유가 유의한 역할을 수행할 수 있음을 제시해 준다. 따라서 본 연구는 국제회계기준의 도입 등으로 충당부채와 같이 상대적으로 기업의 재량권이 개입될 가능성이 높아 회계정보의 유용성에 유의한 영향을 미칠 수 있는 계정과목 및 전문적인 판단문제들이 증가하고 있는 현 상황에서, 기업내부에서 효과적으로 전문적인 역할을 수행할 수 있는 감사 기구지배구조를 확립하고 내부회계․공시전문인력을 보다 적극적으로 보유하려는 노력과 더불어 외부감사인의 감사품질을 높이려는 정책적인 노력이 필요함을 시사해 주고 있다.