运用衍生金融工具的公司支付的审计费用更高吗?

Do the Companies Using Derivative Financial Instruments Pay More Audit Fees?

衍生金融工具的高风险性、会计准则弹性及相关会计处理的复杂性,可能通过影响审计成本和审计师诉讼风险而作用于审计费用。基于2007—2016年所有A股非金融类上市公司数据,实证检验了衍生金融工具运用对审计费用的影响。结果显示,运用衍生金融工具的公司支付的审计费用总体高于未运用衍生金融工具的公司;在根据管理层持有目的将运用衍生金融工具的公司划分为套保公司和投机套利公司后,发现上述溢价集中表现在投机套利公司中;进一步考虑运用衍生品合约的种类多寡的分析发现,审计费用溢价在多品种运用公司中更突出。这意味着,运用衍生金融工具的公司审计风险更高,审计成本更高,事务所会要求成本补偿和风险溢价。

The high risks of derivative financial instruments, the elasticity of accounting standards and the complexity of the relevant accounting treatment may act on the audit fee through affecting audit costs and auditor＇s litigation risks. Based on the data of all A-share non-financial listed companies from 2007 to 2016, this paper empirically examines the impact of derivative financial instruments on audit fees. The findings show that the audit fees paid by the companies using derivative financial instruments are generally higher than that paid by the companies not using derivative financial instruments. When dividing the companies using derivative financial instruments into the hedging companies and the speculation arbitrage companies according to the holding purposes of the management, it can be found that the above-mentioned premium has a concentrated expression among the speculation arbitrage companies. The findings of the analysis which takes further considerations of the numbers of kinds of derivative contracts show that the audit fee at a premium is more prominent among the companies using multiple kinds of derivative financial instruments. This implies that the companies using derivative financial instruments have higher audit risks and higher audit costs, so that the audit firms would charge cost reimbursement and risk premium.