2008年全球金融危机和2015年我国股市的大幅波动凸显了股价崩盘风险的重大研究价值,现有研究主要关注了股价崩盘风险的动因,而忽视了对其经济后果的直接检验。本文从审计费用角度研究股价崩盘风险的经济后果,旨在探讨审计师在审计决策时是否以及如何使用客户股价崩盘风险这一信息。研究发现,公司股价崩盘风险越高,审计师收取的审计费用越高,这表明审计师在做出审计决策时的确考虑股价崩盘风险信息;并且,公司股价崩盘风险与审计费用的正向关系在公司为国企、未完成股权分置改革、审计师规模较大以及公司所处地区市场化程度较高时更显著。进一步研究发现,公司股价崩盘风险越高,审计师花费的审计时间越长,这表明公司股价崩盘导致增加的审计费用包含了对审计努力的价格补偿。本文的研究结果表明,股价崩盘存在明显的溢出效应,会影响审计师的审计定价决策。这从审计师角度丰富了股价崩盘风险经济后果的相关研究。
The global financial crisis in 2008 and the fluctuations in China's stock market in 2015 by big margin underscore the significance to study stock price crash risk. The existing literature mainly focuses on the factors influencing stock price crash risk but ignores direct tests of its economic consequences. This paper studies the economic consequences of firms' stock price crash risk from a perspective of audit fees to discuss whether and how auditors use clients' stock price crash risk when doing decision-making. It finds that audit fees are positively correlated with firms' stock price crash risk, which means that auditors take stock price crash risk into consideration when making audit decisions. The positive relation between stock price crash risk and audit fees is more significant when firms are SOEs, or firms do no finish non-tradable shares reform, or firms are in more developed province, or auditors are Big8. Further analyses indicate that firms' stock price crash risk increases auditors' audit time, which means that the increase in audit fees caused by stock price crash risk include price premium for audit efforts. This paper finds that firms' stock price crash risk has a spillover effect on auditors' audit pricing decisions and enriches the research concerning the economic consequences of stock price crash risk from a perspective of auditors.