GAO study on audit firm rotation

  • News default Image

02 Dec 2003

The US General Accounting Office (GAO) has published its report on Public Accounting Firms – Required Study on the Potential Effects of Mandatory Audit Firm Rotation.

The study was mandated by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002.

"GAO believes that mandatory audit firm rotation may not be the most efficient way to strengthen auditor independence and improve audit quality considering the additional financial costs and the loss of institutional knowledge of the public company's previous auditor of record, as well as the current reforms being implemented. The potential benefits of mandatory audit firm rotation are harder to predict and quantify, though GAO is fairly certain that there will be additional costs."

Click to Download the GAO Study (PDF 575k).

Correction list for hyphenation

These words serve as exceptions. Once entered, they are only hyphenated at the specified hyphenation points. Each word should be on a separate line.