FINAL EXAM COPY COPY Flashcards
Risk that relates to peculiarities of individual firm’s data
Firm specific (unsystematic risk)
What is the risk that the observed F/S ≠ True F/S?
Information Risk
Category of EM: opportunistic accounting estimates
Accounting Manipulation
2 agency problems that raise agency costs with the Agency theory:
Information asymmetry & divergent acts
COMMON LAW—THIRD PARTIES: Third Party Must Prove for Negligence
- The auditor had a duty to the plaintiff to exercise due care. 2. The auditor breached that duty and was negligent in not following the professional standards. 3. The auditor’s breach of due care was the direct cause of the 3rd party’s injury. 4. The 3rd party suffered an actual loss as a result.
Third Party Must Prove - Fraud
- A false representation by the CPA. 2. Knowledge or belief by the CPA that the representation was false. 3. The CPA intended to induce the 3rd party to rely on the false representation. 4. The 3rd party relied on the false representation. 5. The 3rd party suffered damages.
risks due to factors not related to sampling. Failure to recognize error in a document or transaction or failure to apply appropriate audit procedures.
Nonsampling Risk
Sampling Theory: Uses attribute-sampling theory
Monetary-Unit Sampling (MUS)
What is the following factor’s relationship to sample size, Direct or indirect? Expected Misstatement
Direct, as it decreases, sample size decreases and vice versa
Forms of Overconfidence: Falsely thinking that you are better than others.
Overplacement
Plausibility vs. Sufficiency
Auditor have tendency to accept 1st plausible answer and don’t consider enough the sufficiency of the answer (overreliance on mngmnt explanation)
Once the desired confidence level is established, the sample size is determine largely by what?
Precision - How much the tolerable error exceeds expected error
The risk that a misstatement that could occur in an account balance or class of transactions and that could be material, individually or when aggregated with misstatements in other balances or classes, will not be prevented or detected and corrected on a timely basis by the accounting and internal control systems. (measurable)
Control Risk
2 step process in sampling a population
Project population, adjust for Sampling Risk
Important Concepts: Concerned with “How Many” – Used to “Test (Internal) Controls” – Are controls working?
Attribute Sampling
Definition: Actions taken with the knowledge and intent to deceive
Fraud
Forms of Overconfidence: Thinking you are better than you really are.
Overestimation
Category of EM: The use of actual business transactions to manipulate earnings.
Real Activities
Definition: People tend to direct their information search towards evidence that confirms their beliefs, thereby following a positive test strategy. Motivation plays a key role
Confirmatory Strategies
Generally regulates the disclosure of information in a registration statement for a new public offering of securities.
Securities Act of 1933
Definition: A wrongful act, other than breach of contract, for which civil action may be taken.
Tort
Definition: the purposeful intervention in the external financial reporting process, with the intent of obtaining some private gain
Earnings Management
(Potential) Problems with Rational Decision Making:
- Human Cognitive Limits (Bounded Rationality) 2. Criteria/goals are malleable, hard to compare, 3. Uncertainty and risk 4. Emotions or Affect 5. Framing 6. Subjective Utility is difficult to quantify
Important Concepts: Used to audit for OVERSTATEMENT. Used to estimate max amount of Error in population
Dollar Unit Sampling
Class of law: Written law enacted by the legislative branch of government
Statutory Law
Class of law: Case law developed by judges
Common Law
Detection Risk is _______ related to the amount of evidence required
Inversely - lower the DR, more evidence required
Strategy used when standards are subjective = Bias evidence collection, Depth of information processing, Information combination supporting conclusion, The goal is only accepted if it can be justified while maintaining the “illusion of objectivity”
Motivated Reasoning - Directional Goals
Heuristic: We judge the likelihood (probability) of an event by deciding how representative that event is of a larger population of events from which it was drawn
The Representativeness Heuristic
Audit Quality is consistent with:
Earnings Quality (normally the deviation of net income and operating cash flow)
Liability Under Sarbanes-Oxley: Penalty for Document destruction
Felony w/ penalty of up to 20 years
Federal Statutory Law - Civil Liability
Negligence, Gross negligence, fraud
Forms of Overconfidence: Being too certain that you know the truth.
Over-precision
Common Law Liability for Ordinary Negligence to Third Parties Approach: Auditor aware of identity, they are specifically identified, and auditor acted as though aware
Credit Alliance v. Arthur Andersen & Co.
- Near Privity
Sampling Theory: Used for $’s rather than attributes
Monetary-Unit Sampling (MUS)
2 risks of material misstatment
Control risk and inherent risk
What theory says people take information into account, use it wisely, do not systematically make mistakes
Rational expectations theory
What is the following factor’s relationship to sample size, Direct or indirect? Tolerable Deviation Rate
Inverse, as it decreases, sample size increases
The basic argument is that management can share liability exposure with an auditor and share the cost.
The Insurance Hypothesis; We now have proportionate liability unless you knowingly violate the securities act!
Common Law - Liability to clients
Breach of contract, Negligence, Gross negligence, fraud
Conditions that create the demand for audits: conflict between an information preparer and a user can result in biased information production
Conflict of Interest
Self-Serving Bias - Example aspects of human nature that amplify the problem:
Familiarity with client, Discounting of delayed consequences, Escalation – we explain away minor issues
the risk that the auditor may unknowingly fail to appropriately modify his or her opinion on financial statements that are materially misstated (AU 312.02).
Audit Risk
influence more by most thing you see (pain study) - IC, Accounting Issues, GC, Performance Evals
Recency Bias (Order Effects) - significant experience and motivational factors seem to decrease this.
Prevents plaintiffs from seeking to evade the protections that Federal law provides against abusive litigation by filing suit in State, rather than Federal Court
Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act of 1998
Important Concepts: Selection of every nth item in the population. Used where population items are not numbered
Systematic Selection
Problem with Rational Decision Making:
Weight the criteria - Problems if try to apply broadly among different people – they can change depending on the others (weighting is VERY subjective)
SEC (2000) and SOX (2002) ban 9 types of non-audit services:
- bookkeeping 2. financial IS design and implementation 3. appraisal or valuation services 4. actuarial services 5. internal audit outsourcing services 6. management functions or human resources 7. investment adviser banking services 8. legal services and expert services9. any other service deemed unacceptable by the PCAOB
CAMS
Any matter that was or required to be communicated to the AC