This study examines whether the extent of professional relationships between an audit firm and their client’s CFO influences audit quality. If regulators’ concerns that the relationship that develops over time between an audit firm and their client’s CFO impairs auditor judgment are justified, then we should observe a negative relationship between the length of audit firm’s tenure with their client’s CFO and audit quality. The results suggest that mutual audit firm-CFO tenure is associated with lower audit quality measured by the magnitude of discretionary accruals, the reduced incidence of issuance of going-concern audit opinions for distressed companies, and an increased likelihood of the receipt of an Accounting and Auditing Enforcement Release (AAER) from the US. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). These affects are concentrated in a subsample of firms with higher levels of corporate governance concerns. These findings have implications for policies related to audit firm rotation. Specifically, the results suggest that regulators need to consider other relationships underlying audit firm tenure, such as the relationships that form between audit firm and client personnel, when evaluating audit firm rotation policies.

本研究考察审计事务所与其客户的首席财务官之间的专业关系是否影响审计质量。如果监管机构担心审计事务所与其客户的首席财务官之间的关系随着时间的推移而发展会损害审计师的判断是合理的，那么我们应该观察到审计事务所的任期长度与其客户的首席财务官和审计质量之间的负相关关系。结果表明，会计师事务所与首席财务官的共同任期与通过酌情应计金额衡量的较低审计质量、对陷入困境的公司发布持续经营审计意见的发生率降低以及收到会计和财务报告的可能性增加有关。来自美国的审计执法发布 (AAER)。证券交易委员会（SEC）。这些影响集中在公司治理关注程度较高的公司子样本中。这些发现对与审计事务所轮换相关的政策有影响。具体而言，结果表明，在评估会计师事务所轮换政策时，监管机构需要考虑审计事务所任期内的其他关系，例如会计师事务所与客户人员之间形成的关系。