| الوصف: |
The unprecedented downfall of Enron Corporation in 2001, otherwise also known as the ‘Enron scandal’ shook the financial market and subsequently resulted in the ‘unexpected’ closure of one of the ‘Big 5’ accounting firm Arthur Anderson. The collapse of these two giant companies have provided an increased impetus for the improvements in financial reporting and auditing (Graham and Neil, 2004, p.10). This incident has triggered intervention by the US government, which introduced immediate changes, reforms and new regulations over the accounting and auditing industry with the aim of restoring confidence amongst the stakeholders and general members of the public. The 2008 financial crisis has not only been overshadowed by the attempted reforms in the US, and instead, the crisis spread across the globe. One of the key attributes to the crisis stem from the auditing profession where auditors had continuously failed or erred in exercising due diligence in issuing clean opinions on the fraudulent statements to major financial institutions. The repercussions have, once again eroded the public confidence and trust in the auditing industry, the market do not seem have been assured by the unqualified financial report produce by large accounting firms (Sikka, 2009), hence justifying further examination into potential further reforms, or intervention from the government. Therefore, the main aim of this research is to explore the potential approaches in rebuilding confidence on the financial audit services. This research shall also evaluate the feasibility of potential changes which are needed for the future development of the audit profession. The research design primarily leans towards the qualitative means with semi-structured interviews methods. The investigation into the causes of financial crisis and reforms of the auditing profession necessitate the researcher to seek the knowledge in confirming the ‘truth’ and this may be done from the epistemology perspective. In ensuring the credibility and viability of the primary ... |