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This paper explores the role of textual disclosures in the Management, Discussion, and Analysis (MD&A) section of a firm's SEC 10-K filing in predicting a firm's ability to continue as a going concern. Using a sample of firms that filed for bankruptcy between 1995 and 2012 to identify firms that cease as a going concern, we find that both management's opinion about going concern reported in the MD&A and the linguistic tone of the MD&A together provide significant explanatory power in predicting whether a firm will cease as a going concern. Moreover, the predictive ability of MD&A disclosure is incremental to financial ratios, market-based variables, and even the auditor's going concern opinion. We also find that the incremental predictive ability of MD&A disclosures extends to three years prior to bankruptcy.

Larger offices of Big 4 auditors are predicted to have higher quality audits for SEC registrants due to greater in-house experience in administering such audits. We test this prediction by examining a sample of 6,568 U.S. firm-year observations for the period 2003–2005 and audited by 285 unique Big 4 offices. Results are consistent with larger offices providing higher quality audits. Specifically, larger offices are more likely to issue going-concern audit reports, and clients in larger offices evidence less aggressive earnings management behavior. These findings are robust to extensive controls for client risk factors and to controls for other auditor characteristics. While the evidence suggests audit quality is higher on average in larger Big 4 offices, we make no claims that audit quality is unacceptably low in smaller offices.

This study examines the auditor's going-concern opinion and its impact on the propensity for bankruptcy and judicial reorganization among companies listed on the Brazilian stock exchange (B3). The analysis is based on a sample of 256 companies (1,364 firm-year observations) from 2010 to 2020, using logistic and negative binomial regression models. The results indicate that, although auditors do not formally modify the audit opinion, the mere disclosure of going concern uncertainties in the independent auditor's report is associated with an increased probability of insolvency. The evidence suggests that this signaling acts as a market trigger, contributing to the debate on the \"self-fulfilling prophecy\" and the auditor's dilemma between regulatory compliance and caution. This study has implications for regulators, auditors, and users of accounting information, reinforcing the importance of going concern reporting as a signaling mechanism.

We examine how state liability regimes within the United States affect auditor reporting decisions. We exploit variation across state-level common law in two aspects of auditor liability: the extent to which auditors can be held liable by third parties for negligence, and rules for apportioning liability across multiple defendants. We find that auditors are more likely to issue a modified going-concern (GC) report to financially distressed clients from high-liability states than to those from low-liability states. We sharpen inferences using a natural experiment that examines the causal effects of two exogenous shocks to auditor third-party liability standards, which dramatically restricted auditors' liability in New Jersey in 1995 and in California in 1992. Results from difference-in-differences tests imply that auditors' propensity to issue a modified opinion for client firms in New Jersey and California decreases significantly after the decline in auditors' litigation exposure, relative to control firms from other jurisdictions. These findings add to our understanding of how litigation risk affects auditor behavior and highlight an important source of variation in litigation risk within the U.S. that has seldom been studied to date.

Auditor going concern modifications (GCMs) are intended to provide market participants with information related to financial distress, and prior research suggests that the disclosure of a GCM elicits a substantial negative market reaction from investors. In this study, we investigate the market reaction to GCMs in a contemporary disclosure regime and consider whether the observed market reaction is confounded by other material disclosures. We find that the majority of GCMs are issued concurrently with earnings announcements (EAs) and that EAs in the year of new GCMs elicit large negative cumulative abnormal returns (CARs). We also find that CARs surrounding GCMs are significantly more negative when GCMs are disclosed with EAs versus following EAs. We then evaluate whether GCMs convey distress that is incremental to EA disclosures by measuring i) the market reaction to GCMs disclosed following EAs, and ii) whether EA CARs are substantially more negative for companies disclosing GCMs with EAs as opposed to after EAs. In both cases, we find that the incremental market response to GCMs is statistically weak and much smaller in economic magnitude than is suggested by prior research. Finally, we find that management disclosures in EAs, rather than the presence of a GCM, appear to convey information that investors use to anticipate bankruptcy. Taken together, these findings suggest that GCMs are confounded by other significant disclosures and that the informational benefits of GCM reporting are significantly smaller than previously thought.

Audit researchers have a long-standing interest in understanding whether issuing a going concern report to financially stressed clients protects auditors from litigation. An endogeneity issue arises, in that litigation risk affects the going concern decision and the going concern decision impacts auditor litigation risk. Using a simultaneous equations approach, we find a significant positive association between auditors' ex ante litigation risk and going concern reporting. By applying simultaneous equations, we also find a significant negative association between going concern reporting and auditor litigation, suggesting that auditors deter lawsuits by issuing going concern reports to their financially stressed clients. Our research further provides a more rigorous analysis of the relation between going concern reporting and lawsuit outcomes in the form of auditor litigation dismissals, small settlement amounts, and large settlement amounts. Our results indicate that when auditors are named in lawsuits, having issued a going concern report reduces the likelihood of large financial settlements.

Purpose This study aims to examine auditors’ perceptions of the changes in audit processes, fees, salaries and trainings during the Lebanese multidimensional crisis. The aim is to understand how going concern assessments were affected by the distortions imposed by the crisis. Design/methodology/approach Data was collected through a survey distributed among auditors at Big 4 audit firms in Lebanon during the crisis. The questionnaire, inspired by prior desk study research, aims to empirically assess auditors’ attitudes toward the variances in audit operations during the crisis and their implications on going concern assessments. This study uses the structural equation modeling (SEM) technique to develop and assess the research model. Findings The findings reveal notable changes in audit processes, fees, salaries and training programs during the crisis. SEM results highlight the association between the crisis-driven changes in audit procedures, fees and salaries and the increased uncertainty in issuing going concern assessments. Practical implications This study provides recommendations for both the auditing industry and regulatory bodies to ensure audit firms are prepared to face crises that might disrupt their work. Recommendations include the initiation of crisis management training programs, investments in technology solutions, the establishment of a protocol in response to crisis and the adoption of flexible yet reliable audit procedure to accommodate for the challenges of the crisis. Originality/value The originality of this study emanates from its adoption of a novel survey to assess a conceptual model that has not been empirically tested in earlier studies. The model examines changes in audit operations during the Lebanese crisis and their implications on going concern assessments, a context that has received little attention in the literature.

We study the information content and determinants associated with voluntary management disclosures of going concern (GC) uncertainties by IPO issuers. In terms of information content, we examine IPO price revision and initial return and find robust support that management GC disclosures are associated with downward revisions in the IPO offer price and, upon considering the mediating effects of the price revision, also associated with lower initial returns. In terms of determinants, and after controlling for other factors (e.g., issuer distress, start-up status, size, cash burn), we find that the presence of a management GC disclosure is negatively associated with a proxy for issuer financial incentives to withhold \"bad news\" and positively associated with the extent of risk factors disclosure. Overall, our results provide support for the information content of voluntary management disclosures of GC uncertainties by IPO issuers, the presence of which is associated with agency and risk motivations.

Existenta continua a unei companii este unul dintre cele mai importante obiective. Din acest motiv, atunci cand auditeazá о companie auditorii trebuie sá evalueze capacitatea companiei de a rámáne operationalá pe piatá in viitorul previzibil. Acest studiu isi propune sá analizeze principalii factori care ar trebui luati in considerare in procesul de audit, legati de evaluarea continuitátii activitatii, evidentiind totodatá rolul auditorilor. Esantionul utilizat a fost format din 27 de companii si 84 de rapoarte de audit, extrase din baza de date Audit Analytics, pentru perioada 2016-2023. Companiile auditate au provenit in principal din domeniul industriei prelucrátoare (60%) si din domeniul comertului cu ridicata si cu amanuntul (15%). Rezultatele aratá са existá si factori suplimentari, pe lángá cei financiari, care pot fi luati in considerare, cum ar fi industria, opinia din anul precedent si asa mai departe. Opinia auditorului este de o importantá esentialá deoarece influenteaza increderea investitorilor si comportamentul acestora, iar transparenta situatiilor financiare este imbunátátitá.

The literature provides mixed evidence on whether investors find audit reports modified for going concern reasons to be useful. Using a substantially larger sample than previous studies, we observe negative excess returns when the going concern audit report (GCAR) is disclosed. We find that the reaction is more negative if the GCAR cites a problem with obtaining financing, suggesting that the GCAR provides new information to investors. Also, the reaction is more adverse if the GCAR triggers a technical violation of a debt covenant that restricts the firm from getting a GCAR. The evidence suggests that institutional investors drive the reaction to the GCAR, since there is no detectable reaction at low levels of institutional ownership. The market reaction gets more negative as the level of institutional ownership increases, and there is a decline in institutional ownership after the GCAR is issued. We attribute these results to sophisticated investors' awareness of the firm's financing needs and the covenants carried by the firm's debt.