Does audit independence have an impact on issued sanctions? : A quantitative study of listed companies in the Swedish setting

Sammanfattning: This study investigated the relationship between audit independence and audit quality, which is measured by sanctions issued by Nasdaq Stockholm Exchange. Sanctions as a tool to measure audit quality is uncommon, this study is one of the first studies using this approach in Europe. The investigation was based on a sample size of 49 company-years, and a total of 16 unique companies that are or were listed on either Nasdaq Stockholm or Nasdaq First North between the years of 2008-2018. The study used a logistic regression model to investigate the relationship between the dependent and independent variables since the dependent variable was classified as a binary variable. Three different proxy variables were used to measure audit independence, Audit Tenure, Client Importance and Non-Audit Services. The study found indications about a negative relationship with each proxy variable, however the findings were not strong enough to be statistically significant, which led to the conclusion that this study did not find any association between sanctions and the chosen variables.