News

On June 24, 2021, Joseph Akadeagre Agana successfully defended his dissertation titled “Implications of accounting and audit regulations”. In the three studies, he examined the impact of accounting and audit regulations on audit fees, accounting quality and auditors’ use of experts. Congratulations, Dr. Agana!

Took place in conjunction with the AMIS 2020 Conference and was hosted by IFRA partner Bucharest University of Economic Studies on September 28-29, 2020. Scholars from around the world participated to present on pressing research topics and provide input to early career researchers on their work. List of workshop faculty is below.

Paul Andre, HEC Lausanne, Switzerland

Catalin Albu, Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Romania

Nadia Albu, Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Romania

Anna Alon, University of Agder, Norway

Robert Faff, University of Queensland, Australia

Andrei Filip, ESSEC Paris, France and IAAER VP Administration

Martin Glaum, WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management, Germany

Sebastian Hoffmann, University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom

Katherine Schipper, Duke University, USA

Donna Street, University of Dayton, USA

Elmar Venter, University of Pretoria in South Africa

A study of Norwegian accounting standards focused on Standardization and Comparability by Alon, Haaland, and Røsok was accepted for presentation at the Research Forum organized by the International Accounting Standards Board in conjunction with the Accounting and Business Research journal. Presentation is on 2-3 November 2020.

Helene Johansen and Kristina Ågedal published an article based on their master theses about IFRS for SMEs in Norway. They were supervised by Terje Heskestad, Professor at the Department of Economics and Finance at the University of Agder.
https://www.idunn.no/pof/2020/04/ifrs_for_smes_i_norge_blir_brukerhensyn_ivaretatt

Stephen Zamore, post-doc on the IFRA project, received the prestigious Emerald & EFMD Outstanding Doctoral Research Award for his research on microfinance. https://www.uia.no/en/news/award-winning-research-on-microfinance

Due to Covid-19 restriction, the Regnskapstreff i Sør was rescheduled and is expected to take place June 3-4, 2021. More information at https://www.uia.no/om-uia/fakultet/handelshoeyskolen-ved-uia/regnskapstreff-i-soer

The event will focus on accounting regulation in Norway. We look forward to seeing you there.

Meetings/presentations

• Nordic Corporate Governance Alliance meeting to establish a dataset of Nordic corporate governance data. Represented Norway in a workshop with other Nordic universities organized at Copenhagen Business School on February 6^th, 2019.
• IFRA researchers mentor at the ACCA & IAAER Emerging Scholars Workshop at held at the partner institution, Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Romania, June 3-4, 2019. Presentation: Winding adventure: From R&R to publication.
• Presented on a panel at Accounting and Management Information Systems Conference, Bucharest, Romania, June 5-6, 2019. Topic: The changing practice of audit.
• Presented at a workshop organized by IFRA partner, Alliance Manchester Business School, UK, December 6, 2019. Topic: The social relevance of accounting research.

Publications

Ømer, A., Irgens, M., Haaland, G. 2019. Omtale av sentrale forhold øker brukernytten (Impact of key audit matters on users). Revisjon og Regnskap, 1, 22-26.

Alon A., Mennicken A., and Samsonova-Taddei A. 2019. Dynamics and limits of regulatory privatization: Re-organizing audit oversight in Russia. Organization Studies, 40(8), 1217-1239. ABS Level 4.

Papers that were presented/submitted

Agana J., Alon A., Zamore S. 2019. Audit fees: A bibliometric analysis of the literature. Presented at the following conferences and will be submitted to a journal in February 2020.

• 42^nd Annual Congress of the European Accounting Association, Paphos, Cyprus, 29-31 May, 2019.
• Workshop on European Financial Reporting (EUFIN), Vienna, Austria, August 29-30. 
• Revised to focus on regulation and submitted to 43rd Annual Congress of the European Accounting Association, Bucharest, Romania, May 27-29, 2020.

Albu, C. N., Albu, N., Alon, A. 2019. Audit field and pathways of change: Experimenting with audit at the periphery of capitalism. Presented at the conferences listed below. The paper was submitted to an international journal, received a revise and resubmit, and significant work was performed to re-submit it in December 2019.

• 42^nd Annual Congress of the European Accounting Association, Paphos, Cyprus, 29-31 May, 2019.
• 14^th Accounting and Management Information Systems international conference (AMIS IAAER 2019), Bucharest, Romania, 5-6 June, 2019.
•  9^th International Conference on Financial Reporting and Auditing, Cracow, Poland, 12-13 December, 2019.

The following papers were submitted to 43^rd Annual Congress of the European Accounting Association by our Ph.D. students. Fingers crossed we get to present them!

• Agana, J. Key audit matters: Implications for the use of specialists and audit fees.
• Mwintome, G. and co-authors. Auditor choice and its implications for microfinance institutions.

Second IFRA workshop was held at UiA’s School of Business and Law on May 6, 2019.

Project partners from PwC, Revisjon Sør, and Revisorforeningen joined researchers from Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Hanken School of Economics, Alliance Manchester Business School, and University of Edinburgh to discuss ongoing research projects and developments in accounting and auditing.  

For 2020, Regnskapstreff i Sør conference is planned for June 4-5.

https://www.uia.no/om-uia/fakultet/handelshoeyskolen-ved-uia/aktuelt-paa-handelshoeyskolen-ved-uia/regnskapstreff-i-soer-neste-arrangement-2020

An article discussing usefulness of key audit matters in the audit report was published in Revisjon og Regnskap(issue 1, 2019). It is based on a master thesis and examines whether key audit matters should also be included in the audits of private companies. Read more here: Omtale av sentrale forhold øker brukernyttene.

Dear IFRA contributors,

2018 was busy and exciting year for the IFRA project. Below is a short summary of some of the activities we were involved in. We look forward to a productive year.

Our annual workshop will take place on May 6, 2019. Please hold the date!

Joining us at the University of Agder (UiA) in 2019

• Steven Zamore has completed Ph.D at UiA in December and will join the project in the post-doc position in February. Last year he taught Financial Accounting in the MRR program and Accounting Theory at the Bachelor level. He has strong quantitative analysis background and will contribute to data collection and analysis for projects related to financial reporting and key audit matters.
• Gordon Mwintome completed a Master degree in Accounting at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Ghana and has worked at Baker Tilly audit firm. He is a part of the Ph.D cohort starting at UiA in March. His research will focus on IFRA topics.

UiA Events/Presentations

• Breakfast seminar “How companies should use auditors?” presented by Geir Haaland on February 12.
• Project kick-off workshop at UiA’s School of Business and Law on April 30^th, 2018.

International Events/Presentations

• Nordic Corporate Governance Alliance meeting to establish a dataset of Nordic corporate governance data. Represented Norway in a workshop with other Nordic universities organized at Copenhagen Business School on May 16, 2018.
• Presented on a panel “Challenges and opportunities for audit practice and research”. Accounting and Management Information Systems Conference, Bucharest, Romania, June 13-14, 2018.
• Presentation on “Multi-mode standardization occurring in accounting and auditing” at Accounting and Management Information Systems Conference, Bucharest, Romania, June 13-14, 2018.
• IFRA researchers mentor at the Emerging Scholars Workshop at held at the partner institution, Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Romania, June 11-12, 2018.
• Presentation at the University of Edinburgh. Dynamics and limits of regulatory privatization: Re-organizing audit oversight in Russia. November 13, 2018.

Professional Publication

Ømer, A., Irgens, M., Haaland, G. Omtale av sentrale forhold øker brukernytten (Impact of key audit matters on users). Revisjon og Regnskap (accepted & forthcoming February 2019).