The paper reports the results of a study of the information that four types of audit reports convey to Chartered Financial Analysts about the sources of both financial-statement and audit-report messages. Four hypotheses are tested, two of which concern the perceived identity of the source of specific financial-statement messages. Two others concern the effect of the audit reports on analysts' perceptions of the credibility of the source of financial-statement messages and of the auditor. The study indicates that auditors are perceived to be much more involved in the communication of financial-statement messages than many people realize. This perceived involvement and the information that audit reports convey about the auditor's credibility combine to produce some unsuspected credibility effects.