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Journal of Accounting and Economics Vol. 17 No. 1-2 1994

The association between audit quality, retained ownership, and firm-specific risk in U.S. vs. Canadian IPO markets

Peter M. Clarkson1; Dan A. Simunic2

1 Simon Fraser University · 2 University of British Columbia

Abstract

This paper tests the demand-side prediction of Datar, Feltham, and Hughes (1991) that new issuers of securities are more likely to choose a high-quality auditor and retain a lower level of ownership as the firm-specific riskiness of future cash flows increases. Previous tests of this hypothesis using U.S. data have generally been inconclusive, perhaps because an increase in the riskiness of client cash flows simultaneously increases an auditor's litigation risk and supply price. Our results using data from a significantly different legal environment (Canada) are consistent with the predictions of Datar, Feltham, and Hughes.

DOI
10.1016/0165-4101(94)90010-8
Volume
17
Issue
1-2
Pages
207-228
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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