Agency Theory, Corporate Governance and Auditor Opinion

• Autor(a) principal: Santos, Marília Medeiros
• Data de Publicação: 2014
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: https://doi.org/10.34624/ei.v0i8.5977

Agency conflicts arose with the separation of ownership and control of modern companies, these conflicts have originated in the different motivations and objectives, the information asymmetry and the different risk preferences that exist between principal and agent. Corporate governance is seen as a mechanism to align the interests of principal and agent, and moreover, it is expected that the audit is also a means of monitoring these differences. With the changes in the global scenario, arising out of the financial scandals of recent years, there has been intense focus on corporate governance and auditing through effective oversight and internal controls. In Portugal, this matter also came acquire importance, as issued by the CMVM recommendations on corporate governance will have evolved over time to ensure greater transparency and reliability of financial reporting and the capital market. This study aims to analyze the effect of ownership structure and corporate direction in audit opinions. To understand how the audit opinions are influenced by certain characteristics related with the corporate governance we analyze the Portuguese non-financial companies listed on Euronext Lisbon during the period between 2008 and 2011. Our results show that the concentration of ownership, the independence of the board, the presence of an audit committee and a good liquidity ratio are positive indicators in the audit opinion and therefore promote more reliable financial information. However, in the Portuguese scenario, the results do not generate, in full, the same effect as the theoretical Anglo-Saxon corporate governance.