The influence of the audit report on the relevance of accounting information reported by listed Romanian companies

Information asymmetry determines investors to call for auditors services. The auditors offer through the audit reports, a professional, objective and independent opinion regarding the presentation in financial statements of the true and the fair view in the most significant aspects of the financial position and performance, in accordance with accounting framework. This paper aims to analyze the influence of the audit report, prepared for the financial statements of the listed companies, on the investors' decision in the financial market regarding the stock acquisition or sale. These decisions have an important impact on the stock return, defined through the relative variation of the stock prices from a period to another. In order to reach this goal, the study has been carried out on a sample of 59 companies, listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange (BSE), during the 2012 reporting period. The results achieved from the ANCOVA regression analysis indicate the influence of the auditors' affiliation to the Big 4 but also the influence of the information provided by the audit report, regarding the audit opinion, and of the information from the financial statement on the stock return. (C) 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.