Yesterday
Samuel’s big four fix: ban firms consulting to audit clients
Former competition watchdog Graeme Samuel also said ASIC should resume naming and shaming firms with poor audit quality.
- Edmund Tadros
This Month
- Opinion
- Opinion
Failing corporate reporting system needs complete overhaul
Not only is Australia lagging the world, its corporate reporting system is failing in its core purpose of providing useful information to investors and others.
- Peter Wells
PwC fined $10.5m over exam cheating by China and Hong Kong staff
US regulator says more than 1000 of firm’s workers cheated on tests designed to familiarise them with US standards.
- Stephen Foley
CA ANZ unhappy about accounting merger
The number-crunching body is upset the government has decided to merge the existing standards bodies into a single entity.
- Edmund Tadros
November
- Opinion
- Chanticleer
PwC scandal hangs over audit quality fight, but clients aren’t waiting
While the professional services sector awaits more detail on ASIC’s new audit quality review, clients are voting with their feet.
- James Thomson
ASIC hopes threat of criminal sanction enough to force good audits
The regulator this year slashed the number of audits it reviews in its annual quality inspection regime from 45 to 30, even amid wider scrutiny on the sector.
- Hannah Wootton
- Opinion
- Opinion
The triple merger that could transform accounting
The government will merge Australia’s three accounting standards bodies into one - in the largest reform to the accounting sector in decades. Not everyone’s happy.
- Edmund Tadros
- Exclusive
- Lendlease
KPMG remains on call as Lendlease’s audit Plan B
The ASX-listed developer says KPMG may need to do another year verifying its financial accounts, as its process of selecting a new auditor remains on hold.
- Michael Bleby, Nick Lenaghan and Edmund Tadros
Exclusive Sydney car club faces collapse as it posts $770,000 loss
The warning comes after eight directors resigned this year from the Royal Automobile Club of Australia and its prior auditors, Walker Wayland, quit.
- Lucas Baird
Westpac to dump PwC as its auditor
The bank said it would not invite the embattled firm, its current auditor, to tender for external audit services, citing “best practice for audit firm rotation”.
- James Eyers, Lucas Baird and Edmund Tadros
ASIC’s 15 checks of 1900 firms ‘very low’, says standards body
The decision to conduct just 15 reviews of high-risk audits in 2022-23 – from 45 the year before – raised serious questions about whether it had “sufficient coverage of the audit” quality.
- Ronald Mizen
October
PwC to give up $10m in advisory work for audit clients
The move is aimed at reducing the risk of conflict and is part of the firm’s effort to win back public trust after its tax leaks scandal.
- Edmund Tadros
Why ASIC stopped naming and shaming the big four over audit quality
The corporate regulator has now flagged it is planning to begin reviewing the operations of the six largest firms from next year.
- Edmund Tadros and Patrick Durkin
Unpleasant work or low pay? What’s behind the auditor shortage
ASIC chairman Joe Longo and Labor senator Deborah O’Neill have different takes on why auditing is struggling to attract graduates.
- Edmund Tadros
US regulator investigates PwC tax leaks after ‘untimely’ report
The powerful US Public Company Accounting Oversight Board is investigating the Australian tax leaks scandal, bringing increased risk to PwC’s global operations.
- Edmund Tadros
Big four audit, consulting model questioned in PwC tax leaks inquiry
The argument that the major accounting firms need access to specialised skills within their consulting businesses to deliver quality audits has been questioned at a Senate inquiry.
- Edmund Tadros
KPMG UK fined record $40m over dodgy Carillion audit
KPMG UK has been hit with a record £21 million ($44.4 million) fine by the UK accounting watchdog for failings in its auditing of collapsed outsourcer Carillion.
- Simon Foy
September
PwC seeks absolution but can it really change?
The publication of two documents and a video apology for the tax leaks scandal this week was meant to be a circuit breaker. But it won’t be that easy.
- Edmund Tadros
Big four earn 99.3pc of top companies’ audit fees
The big four audited 96.5 per cent of Australia’s 200 largest companies in 2022, and lifted fees by 21 per cent.
- Maxim Shanahan
August
Big four name-and-shame audit quality reprieve criticised
The concern comes amid growing disquiet about the dominance of the big four firms – KPMG, PwC, EY and Deloitte – in audit work.
- Ronald Mizen
