The role of audit committee chair tenure—A German perspective

Abstract

This study empirically examines the association of audit committee chair tenure and various reporting quality measures in a German setting. As the debate about the role of tenure has refuelled since the German corporate governance codex first introduced an upper limit for director tenure in 2019, this topic is of particular importance. My findings show that longer tenured audit committee chairs are positively associated with higher levels of earnings management and negatively associated with the audit report lag and the likelihood of error identification by the German financial reporting enforcement panel. I draw upon social bonding to discuss these findings, which seem to be heterogeneous from a reporting quality perspective. I argue that social bonding between management and the AC chair drives the results for earnings management, while it does not impair the AC chair's influence on the audit process. My findings are important from a regulatory and practical perspective.