engleski

Audit reporting as part of corporate reporting

An essential prerequisite for efficient functioning of capital markets is quality and transparent corporate reporting. Namely, information presented in financial statements of corporations should help investors but also to other users of financial statements (creditors, regulators, employees) in making business decisions. Therefore, meeting the information needs of investors and creditors on the capital markets is stated as the main purpose of corporate reporting. In the context of corporate reporting the role of external audit and audit reporting is unquestionable since external audit as the measure of credibility of financial statements directly contributes to quality and to the usefulness of financial statements in the process of decision making. Auditors are mediators between issuers and different users of financial statements and audit report, as final output of audit activities, presents one of the basic instruments of communication and trust between those who create financial statements and those who use them. In this paper authors present types of audit reports according to the International Standards on Auditing and the aim of this paper is to contribute to the highlighting and better understanding of the issues of audit reporting. Authors present relevant standards that give to the auditor instructions for expressing an unqualified opinion or for expressing one of modified audit opinions. After the theoretical elaboration and explication of the issues related to audit reporting authors analyze the practice of audit reporting on the Croatian capital market, i.e. on the Zagreb Stock Exchange. Namely, based on the analysis of audit reports authors determine the frequency and structure of different types of audit reports as well as differences in the structure of certain types of opinions regarding to the type of auditor (Big Four auditors vs. others).

Audit; audit reporting; corporate reporting

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