Revisors uafhængighed: Er adskillelse af revision og ikke-revisionsydelser samt firmarotation den rigtige løsning?

Abstract

According to the European Commission the financial crisis has led to a debate regarding the independence of auditors. The European Commission finds it necessary to reimburse the confidence to auditors and they have therefore introduced a new regulation which means that the Danish auditors must comply with a historically strict regulation. The regulation’s main objectives regarding the independence of auditors is to prohibit non-audit services to be carried out by the same auditor who audited the public interest entities and mandatory rotation of the audit firm every 6 years. These regulations will affect multiple parties in the Danish Society, including auditors, businesses, the Danish regulators and investors, each of whom have their opinion on the proposed regulation. This thesis’ main focus is on the European Commissions suggestions to introduce a separation of audit and non-audit services and mandatory audit firm rotation and it has been discussed whether the auditors’ independence actually will be improved by the implementation of these suggestions. For that purpose this thesis examines the European Commission’s purpose with the proposals and how the involved parties relate to this. Furthermore the thesis aims to determine whether there is a need for further regulation to secure the auditors’ independence. The proposed regulation receives a mixed reception among the parties. One of the main concerns is that the regulation will cause a significant financial burden on the business and the audit firms. Furthermore some of the parties are concerned that the quality of the audit and non-audit services will suffer if the regulation is implemented. None the less the findings in the thesis were that there is a need to ensure the independence of auditors. Examples seen in practice have led to an informed third party to questioning auditors’ independence which is why the thesis has concluded that the auditor can not sufficiently regulate their own independence. In deed, it seems that the European Commission’s suggestions will ensure auditors independence. If focus is mainly on Danish conditions a less extensive regulation, would perhaps be sufficient enough to ensure this and ultimately result in reduced costs.