The Influence of Company Profitability, Corporate Risk, Audit Report Lag, and CEO Gender on Audit Fee

Abstract

This research aims to examine the influence of company profitability, company risk, audit report lag, and CEO gender on audit fees and to test the differences in independent variables and dependent variables before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. The object of this research is non-financial sector companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange in 2018–2021. This research uses secondary data. The number of samples in this research was 75. The sample selection technique used is purposive sampling. Data analysis was done using panel data analysis, paired sample t-tests, and Wilcoxon tests. Results show that the audit report lag variable has a positive effect on audit fees. In contrast, the variables of company profitability, company risk, and CEO gender do not affect audit fees. Based on the results of the average difference test, the profitability and audit report lag variables experienced significant changes before and during the COVID-19 pandemic, while the audit fee, company risk, and CEO gender variables did not experience significant changes before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Keywords: audit fee, company profitability, company risk, audit report lag, CEO gender