Assessment of the quality of the audits of Vietnamese commercial banks financial statements

Abstract

The aim of the research is to assess the quality of the audits of Vietnamese commercial banks’ fi nancial statements in recent years. Two audit quality indicators are used in the assessment: fi rstly, the quality of the audit reports and the audited fi nancial statements; and secondly, the quality of the factors aff ecting audit quality. One of the factors aff ecting audit quality the characteristic of audit organizations such as the scale of the organizations, the level of knowledge in the fi eld of banking audit, Qualifi cations and experience of auditors, Independence of the auditor and the audit organization, Cost of the audit, Audit procedures, Audit quality control. Other factors are quality control of audit of fi nancial statement of commercial banks; communication between banking supervisors; legislative base (system of accounting standards, standards on auditing); and the eff ectiveness of the internal control system (ICS) of commercial banks. To study and assess the quality of the audits of commercial banks’ fi nancial statements, the authors conducted questionnaires, interviews on audit and study of audited accounting (fi nancial) statements. The result of the research indicates that the audits of Vietnamese commercial banks’ fi nancial statements have basically met the quality required by the current auditing standards. However, there are still some shortcomings in audit methodology and procedures, audit reports and audited fi nancial statements. The authors also suggest some measures to the audit fi rms and government bodies to improve the audit quality.