The role of audit committees in improving the earnings quality

Abstract

The research aims to measure the impact of the audit committee’s characteristics on earnings quality. A set of characteristics of the audit committee have been relied upon, perhaps the most important of which is the independence of the audit committee, its size, activities and experience, and its members ’ownership of the company's shares. The study was applied to a sample of companies in the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council. The optional maturity variable was also relied upon to reflect the earnings quality in the sample under study. The study found the impact of the formation of the audit committee on the companies that make up the study sample for the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council. Where the study found a positive impact on the earnings quality for the independence of the audit committee and the activities of the audit committee and the experience of the audit committee. There is also a positive impact on the audit committee members ’ownership of the company's shares, while there was a negative impact on the size of the audit committee. The study recommended the necessity of increasing the effectiveness of the audit committee in supervising the process of preparing financial reports and increasing the earnings quality.