The Impact of Audit Characteristics on Firm Performance: An Empirical Study from an Emerging Economy

The auditor, an important instrument of corporate governance, ensures the transparency and accountability of the firm to the stakeholders. The objective of this paper is to explore the impact of audit characteristics on firm performance. In this study, external audit quality (BIG4), frequencies of audit committee meetings, and audit committee size are used as the proxies of audit characteristics and firm performance is measured through ROA, profit margin and EPS. A total of 503 firm years are considered as sample size from the listed manufacturing firms of Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) during the period of 2013 to 2017 to find out the impact of audit characteristics on firm performance. In this study, multivariate regression analysis is conducted using the pooled OLS method. Moreover, time dummy and lag model of multivariate analysis are also analyzed as robust check. The multivariate regression results find that external audit quality (BIG4) and audit committee size are significantly positively associated with firm performance. This study also finds that there is a significant negative relationship between audit committee meeting and firm performance. This study recommends that the regulatory authority and audit committee should review the frequencies of audit committee meeting to make it more effective to ensure better firm performance.