We study the temporal evolution of going-concern reporting from 2004 to 2013 and test whether sanction risk is related to the likelihood of a going-concern opinion using samples of privately held firms. In 2009, the Supervisory Board of Public Accountants (SBPA) in Sweden started to issue significantly more going-concern-related disciplinary sanctions, and we test whether and how auditors at different audit firms adjust their reporting practices (Type I and Type II errors) in response to the increased sanction risk. Our findings reveal that auditors are more likely to issue going-concern opinions to bankrupt and non-bankrupt firms when the sanction risk is higher, suggesting that sanction risk is positively associated with conservatism in auditors’ reporting. Furthermore, we find that auditors at Big 4 firms alter their reporting to conservative more than non-Top 7 firms when sanction risk increases. Finally, results on the informativeness of going-concern opinions indicate that a going-concern opinion increases the bankruptcy probability during both the lower and higher sanction risk periods, but the impact is higher under the higher sanction risk period.

我们研究了从 2004 年到 2013 年持续经营报告的时间演变，并使用私营公司样本检验制裁风险是否与持续经营意见的可能性有关。2009 年，瑞典公共会计师监督委员会 (SBPA) 开始发布更多与持续经营相关的纪律处分，我们测试不同审计公司的审计师是否以及如何调整其报告实践（I 类和 II 类错误）以应对增加的制裁风险。我们的研究结果表明，当制裁风险较高时，审计师更有可能向破产和非破产公司发表持续经营意见，这表明制裁风险与审计师报告中的保守性呈正相关。此外，我们发现，当制裁风险增加时，与非前 7 大公司相比，四大公司的审计师更倾向于保守地报告。最后，持续经营意见信息量的结果表明，持续经营意见在较低和较高制裁风险期间增加了破产概率，但在较高制裁风险期间影响更大。