Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Internal control material weakness'

I examine firm governance characteristics for a sample of companies disclosing material weaknesses under section 404 of SOX to examine what factors impact the likelihood that a company will disclose those material weaknesses prior to their first section 404 report (under section 302 reporting requirements). I find companies that were audited by industry leading auditors, that have higher quality audit committees, that have shorter auditor/client relationships, that recently restated their financial statements or have been the subject of an SEC AAER, or that have experienced poor financial performance are more likely to discover and disclose weaknesses in their controls under section 302. I find moderate evidence of a positive relationship between company's that have a CFO with financial accounting background and disclosure prior to the SOX 404 report and a negative relationship between a company's institutional ownership concentration and the probability that they disclose weaknesses in their controls prior to the SOX 404 report. In sensitivity tests, I find a positive relationship between a company's institutional ownership concentration and the probability that they disclose significant deficiencies in their controls prior to the SOX 404 report suggesting systematic misclassification of control problems as significant deficiencies rather than material weaknesses in high institutional ownership concentration settings.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2006.
Title from electronic title page (viewed Oct. 10, 2007). "... in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the KenanFlagler Business School (Accounting)." Discipline: Business Administration; Department/School: Business School, Kenan-Flagler.

This study investigates whether the current lack of structure of internal control weakness disclosures (a narrative about the reliability of the financial reporting system) leads nonprofessional investors to make differential investment decisions. Using the non-accelerated filer (smaller public company) setting, where nonprofessional investors are likely to consume unaudited internal control reports in their investing judgments and decisions, I examine two facets of internal control disclosure formats: presentation salience and disaggregation of material weaknesses. A 2 x 2 between-participants behavioral experiment was conducted with internal control presentation salience (bulleted vs. in-text) and disaggregation level (a single material weakness vs. a combination of multiple control deficiencies that is a material weakness). I find that nonprofessional investors reward companies that disclose internal control weaknesses more saliently. The results also indicate that disaggregation interacts with salience in that it increases the effect of salience on investing judgments such that salient (stealth) disclosure of a combination of control deficiencies is viewed more positively (negatively) than salient (stealth) disclosure of a material weakness. These findings are contrary to Rennekamp (2012) who finds that processing fluency in bad news leads to more negative investment judgements. Additional analyses indicated that the results related to management trust and credibility are consistent with prior literature. The findings contribute to academia and practice by shedding light on the importance that needs to be placed on the presentation format of internal control disclosures.

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act mandates public companies to establish internal control systems and assess their effectiveness. Quarterly reports by all companies and annual reports by companies with less than $75 million public float (non-accelerated filers) do not require auditor’s attestation while annual reports by companies with $75 million or more public float (accelerated filers) do require such auditor attestations. Quarterly reports should provide early warning of any impending material weakness (MW) to be disclosed in subsequent annual filings. This dissertation explores three types of “surprise” MW disclosures—positive, negative and no surprise—and consequences of such surprise disclosures. In part one, I document the frequency of surprise MW disclosures and internal control factors that are associated with each surprise type by filer status. Results show that 78 (77) percent of accelerated (non-accelerated) MW disclosures are negative surprise MW disclosures during 2004-2016. Entity level MWs are more associated with no-surprise rather than negative or positive surprise MW disclosures. In part two, I examine some consequences of surprise MW disclosures. The results show that companies with MW disclosures are more likely to dismiss their auditors and CFOs, and experience more shareholder voting against auditor ratification, compared to companies that issue clean reports. Auditor dismissal and CFO turnover are equally likely at negative and no-surprise MW disclosure companies. However, negative surprise accelerated filer companies’ shareholders are more likely to vote against auditor ratification than no-surprise accelerated filer companies. The third essay investigates the association between MW disclosures and audit fees. The results indicate that there is a significant positive association between audit fees and MW disclosures. Further, the results show that audit fees are higher at no-surprise companies than at negative surprise companies. The fourth essay focuses on audit report lag. The results indicate that MWs are associated with increased audit report lags, for both accelerated and non-accelerated filers. Further, surprise MW firms are more likely to experience increased audit report lag than no-surprise MW firms. Overall the results suggest that adverse internal control reports have consequences, and that the consequences vary between surprise and no-surprise MW firms. The results provide relevant empirical evidence to the ongoing debate on the necessity and efficacy of SOX Section 404 requirements.

There are four primary objectives of this study. First, it examines the association between the disclosure of the Internal Control Deficiencies (ICDs), as a proxy for the internal control quality, and information asymmetry (IA) in the secondary loan market. Second, it identifies which types of ICDs exacerbate conditions of information asymmetry in the secondary loan market. Third, it investigates whether firms that remediate or take corrective actions to address ICDs lead to a reduction in information asymmetry in the market. Finally, it examines the effect of the loan specific characteristics such as debt covenants, credit rating and number of lenders (syndication) in the secondary loan market on the association between ICDs and IA. Results suggest that firms that disclose ICDs have significant positive association with IA and that ICDs reported under section 302 have significant positive association with IA. Although results on the association between the severity rank of ICDs by using Internal Control Material Weaknesses (ICMWs) as a proxy and IA are not supported, the use of Company Level (CL) internal control as a proxy for the severity rank of ICDs shows a significant positive association with IA. Overall, firms that remediate their ICDs have significant negative association with IA. Overall, there is a statistical negative association between the interaction term of ICDs and number of lenders (syndication) and IA. Same negative significant association is documented between the interaction term of ICDs and credit rating, and IA and the interaction term of ICDs and debt covenants and IA. The latter result suggests that the secondary loan market unique characteristics mitigate the negative consequences of the disclosure of ICDs and reduce the information asymmetry between lender and multiple arrangers. My results are consistent with prior studies’ (Bryan and Lilien, 2005; Ge and McVay, 2005; Doyle, Ge and McVay 2007 a,b; Ashbaugh-Skaife, Collins, and Kinney, 2007, Ashbaugh-Skaife, Collins, Kinney, and LaFond, 2008), which suggest that firms with reported ICDs are generally small, poor performing, financially weaker, and characterized by higher market risk than firms with effective internal control system.

This thesis investigates how chief executive officer (CEO) equity incentives affect the remediation of material weaknesses (MWs) in internal control. First, we predict that the sensitivity of CEO stock and stock option portfolios to stock price (CEO price sensitivity or delta) has a positive impact on firm promptness in remedying MWs, because CEOs whose personal wealth is tied to stock price suffer losses from negative market reactions to the public disclosure of MWs. Second, we predict that the sensitivity of CEO stock option portfolio to stock-return volatility (CEO volatility sensitivity or vega) has a negative impact on firm promptness in remedying MWs, as firms with internal control weaknesses are associated with higher information and operating risks that manifest in stock return volatility. Our empirical results, based on a sample of firms disclosing MWs in internal control under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) during November 15, 2003 and August 27, 2006, are consistent with the above predictions. We further provide evidence that an effective board of directors could mitigate the undesirable, negative impact of CEO volatility sensitivity on MWs remediation. We measure firms’ promptness in remedying MWs based on their subsequent internal control audit opinions (e.g., Ashbaugh-Skaife et al. 2008; Goh 2009); and CEO price (volatility) sensitivity as the dollar change in CEO stock and option portfolios (option portfolio) from a 1 percent change in stock price (Core and Guay 2002). This thesis is innovative with respect to the prediction and evidence of the opposing effects from CEO price and volatility sensitivities on internal control quality. This new evidence contributes to the literature that examines managerial incentives embedded in stock-based and option-based compensation plans in various economic contexts (e.g., Knopf et al. 2002; Coles et al. 2006; Low 2009; Armstrong et al. 2013). Our findings suggest that when stock constitutes a major part of CEO compensation, the mandatory disclosure requirement of SOX provides a channel for the stock market to discipline CEO. However, when options dominate CEO compensation, volatility sensitivity and the associated risk-taking incentive can cause CEOs to delay rectifying internal control deficiencies. These results have interesting policy implications for regulators and firms concerning mandatory disclosure and compensation design. Moreover, this thesis contributes to the broad literature on corporate governance by documenting an interaction between corporate governance and CEO incentives, namely that strong corporate governance mitigates the undesirable risking-taking incentive caused by CEO option holdings. Overall, this thesis deepens our understanding on mechanisms through which regulators, firm executives, and boards of directors strengthen internal control over financial reporting in the post-SOX era.
published_or_final_version
Business
Doctoral
Doctor of Philosophy

Audit firm tenure impacts the quality of audit work and the disclosure of material internal control weaknesses. Public firms are required by the Sarbanes Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) Section 302 to disclose material internal control weaknesses. Researchers debate whether audit firm rotation is necessary for improving audit quality (Chen, Lin, & Lin, 2008). Generally, an auditor needs sufficient time to become familiar with a client's business in order to enhance effective controls and financial reporting. However, long tenure may diminish auditor independence, and in turn reduce the quality of audit work and encourage a client to violate SOX disclosure requirements. Therefore, it is expected that the disclosure of material internal control weaknesses is less likely given long audit tenure. Prior studies consider many variables that impact the disclosure of control weaknesses, except audit tenure. Further, prior studies do not address the issue of whether familiarity or independence explains non-disclosure. This dissertation investigates the role of audit firm tenure and concludes that the disclosure of material internal control weaknesses is more likely given short tenure. Further, familiarity with the client's business, which is associated with long tenure, explains non-disclosure and not the lack of independence. Therefore, audit firm rotation may not be necessary.

Syfte: Syftet med denna uppsats är att skapa en förståelse för hur Toyota Material Handling Sweden AB organiserar sitt arbete med internkontroll och styrning, samt vilka grundläggande förutsättningar som finns för att erhålla en god internkontroll.  Avgränsning: Denna studie är avgränsad till Toyota Material Handling Sweden AB och dess ekonomiavdelning. På grund av begreppets omfattning klargörs här att studien enbart kommer fokusera på den interna kontrollen och styrningen, det vill säga den kontroll företaget själva utför.   Metod: Denna studie präglas av en kvalitativ metod, en intern fallstudie för att nå djupare förståelse i studiens undersökta företag.  Teoretisk referensram: Den teoretiska referensramen i denna studie baseras på teorier och tidigare studier kring riskhantering, internkontroll, internkontrollens ramverk samt internrevision.  Empiri: I empirin sammanfattas primärdata bestående av en öppen intervju och två semistrukturerade intervjuer öga mot öga, varav en i kombination med en observation, samt sex intervjuer via mejl.  Slutsats: Toyota Material Handling Sweden AB har en väl utvecklad och ständigt närvarande internkontroll genom värderingar, rutiner och ramverket J-SOX. Företaget lägger stor vikt på att integrera alla individer i verksamheten för att nå målen. För att upprätthålla en god internkontroll utgör individerna en grundläggande förutsättning, tillsammans med utbildning, kompetens och uppföljning.
Purpose: The purpose of this study is to create an understanding of how Toyota Material Handling Sweden AB organizes their work in regards to internal control, as well as investigate what essential conditions that are necessary to receive good internal control.  Delimitation: This study is limited to the finance department of Toyota Material Handling Sweden AB. The scope of this study concerns internal control only, that is, the control that the company performs itself.  Method: This study is characterized by a qualitative method. An internal case study to gain a deeper understanding of the study's investigated company.  Theoretical framework: The theoretical framework in this study is based on theories and previous studies on risk management, internal control, internal control framework and internal auditing.  Empirics: The empirics summarizes primary data consisting of an open interview and two semi-structured interviews eye-to-eye, one of them in combination with an observation, and six interviews via email.  Conclusion: Toyota Material Handling Sweden AB has a well developed and constantly present internal control through values, routines and the J-SOX framework. The company highlights the importance of integrating all individuals into the business to achieve the goals. In order to maintain good internal control, individuals are an essential condition, together with education, competence and follow-up.

In order to be competitive, one way is to focus on the internal logistics in a cost effective manner. The concept of material control covers how to control the flow of material resources from the customer to the supplier. This study intends to look at how internal material control can be done efficiently in a manufacturing company. In order to achieve an efficient internal material control, methods and approaches should be evaluated based on a situational approach. Therefore, the purpose of the study is to develop a model for analysis and improvement of internal material control in manufacturing companies. The study is a case study and has been conducted on site at Atlas Copco Tierp Works. Atlas Copco in Tierp, produces components and assembles hand-held power tools. The empirical data has been conducted with employees at Atlas Copco Tierp Works and with direct observations of the processes that the study has been limited to. Literature reviews have been made in parallel with the empirical data collection with an emphasis on internal logistics, material control and lean production. The study shows which factors that are important for an effective internal material control. Furthermore, the report presents an analysis model, which has been applied to Atlas Copco Tierp Works. The analysis model presents a recommendation on appropriate material planning method, as well as the conditions that should be complied in order to achieve an efficient internal material control. The analysis model strengths are considered as mainly to be that it covers many areas, by including the planning environment, material planning methods, efficiency and decision-making. Accordingly, the model is considered to have potential for development by including a cost analysis as a part of the decision-making part.
Att styra sin interna logistik, på ett kostnadseffektivt sätt, är en nödvändighet för att kunna konkurrera på en redan hårt utsatt marknad. Materialstyrning kan ses som en delmängd av logistik och innefattar aktiviteter för att styra och planera materialflödet från leverantör till kund. Denna studie visar på hur den interna materialstyrningen kan ske effektivt, i ett tillverkande företag. För att uppnå en effektiv intern materialstyrning så bör metoder och tillvägagångssätt utvärderas utifrån ett situationsanpassat synsätt. Studiens syfte är därför att utveckla en modell för analys och förbättring av intern materialstyrning i tillverkande företag. Fallstudien har bedrivits vid Atlas Copco Tierpverken. Vid fabriken i Tierp sker tillverkning av komponenter samt montering av handhållna industriverktyg. Den empiriska datainsamlingen har skett genom intervjuer med medarbetare på Tierpverken och observationer över det interna materialflödets processer som studien avgränsat sig till. En litteraturundersökning har gjorts, med betoning på intern logistik, materialstyrning och Lean Production. Studien visar vilka faktorer som är av betydelse för en effektiv intern materialstyrning. Rapporten presenterar en analysmodell, vilken har tillämpats på Atlas Copco Tierpverken. Analysmodellen ger en rekommendation på lämplig materialstyrningsmetod, samt vilka förutsättningar som bör uppfyllas för att uppnå en effektiv intern materialstyrning.  Analysmodellens styrkor anses främst vara att den täcker in många områden, där planeringsmiljö, materialstyrningsmetoder, effektivitet inkluderas för att beslut och rekommendationer kan utföras. Modellen bedöms ha utvecklingspotential genom att inkludera en kostnadsanalys som en del vid beslut.

Thesis (MScMed)--Stellenbosch University, 2008.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Introduction: Flow cytometry has progressively replaced many traditional laboratory tests due to its greater accuracy, sensitivity and rapidity in the routine clinical settings especially clinical trails. It is a powerful tool for the measuring of chemical (the fluorochrome we add) and physical (size and complexity) characteristics of individual cells. As these instruments became major diagnostic and prognostic tools, the need for more advanced quality control, standardized procedures and proficiency testing programs increased as these instrumentations and their methodology evolve. Minor instrument settings can affect the reliability, reproducibility and sensitivity of the cytometer and should be monitored and documented in order to ensure identical conditions of measurement on a daily basis. This can be accomplished by following an Internal Quality Assurance (IQA) and/ or External Quality Assurance (EQA) program. Currently there are no such programs available in South Africa and poorer Africa countries. HIV is a global concern and the laboratories and clinics in these places are in need of such IQA programs to ensure quality of their instrumentation and accurate patient results. Quality assurance programs such as CD Chex® and UK Nequas are available but due to bad sample transport, leave the receiving laboratories with nightmares. It would be best if there was a laboratory in South Africa that could provide the surrounding laboratories with stabilized whole blood samples that can be utilized as IQA. The transport of these samples can be more efficient due to shorter distance and thus the temperature variations limited. Aims and Objectives: The aim of Chapter one is to familiarize the reader with general terminology and concepts of immunology. Chapter two describes in detail the impact stabilized whole blood had on clinical immunology concerning Quality Control and Quality Assurance. The objective of this study is to stabilize whole blood with a shelf life of greater than 30 days to serve as reference control material for South African Immunophenotyping. It is further an objective to use these in-house stabilized control samples for poorer African countries as Internal Quality Assurance reference material. It is a still further objective to stimulate various lymphocyte subsets to express activation antigens and then stabilize these cells for more specialized immunological test and can serve as a QC for those required samples. Study design: In Chapter three, the method currently used to stabilize whole blood was modified. The stability of different concentrations of a first stabilizing agent (Chromium Chloride hexahydrate) was investigated. Incubation periods and concentrations of paraformaldehyde as second stabilizing agent were investigated. Blood samples from healthy individuals (n=10) were stabilized and monitored for the routine HIV phenotypic surface antigens over a period of 40 days. These samples (n=10) were compared on the Becton Dickinson Biosciences (BD) FACSCalibur™ versus BD FACSCount™ instrumentation. Blood samples (n=3) were stabilized and monitored to identify phenotypic cell surface molecules for as long as possible. They were quantified on both flow cytrometric instruments. In addition, these stabilized samples (n=3) were investigated as control blood for calibration purposes on the BD FACSCount™ instrument. In Chapter four, lymphocytes were isolated and activated with various stimuli to express sufficient activation antigens such as CD25, CD69, HLA-DR and CD40 Ligand on the T helper cell surfaces. These activated antigens were analyzed on the BD FACSCalibur™ and further stabilized to serve as possible IQA samples in future. Results: In Chapter three, the ten individual stabilized samples had non-significant P values (P > 0.05) for CD3, CD4 and CD8 percentages and absolute values comparing day 3 until day 40. Comparing the BD FACSCalibur™ versus BD FACSCount™, resulted in a R2 = 0.9848 for CD4 absolute values and a R2 = 0.9636 for CD8 absolute values. Stabilized blood samples (n=3) were monitored for routine HIV phenotypic markers until day 84. The cells populations were easily identifiable and could be quantified on both BD FACSCalibur™ and BD FACSCount™ instruments. In Chapter four; for the activation study purposes, activated T helper lymphocytes expressed approximately 25 to 35% CD40 Ligand cell surface molecules. The stimulant of choice was Ionomycin at a 4μM concentration. Cells were incubated for four hours at 37 degree Celsius in a 5% CO2 environment. For CD69 surface expression, 6 hour incubation was optimum. The stimulus of choice in this case was 4μM Ionomycin which induced 84.21% CD69 expression in the test samples. For CD25 expression; 6 hour incubation with PHA resulted in approximately 43% of CD25 expression. For HLA-DR surface expression; 6 hour incubation with PHA resulted in approximately 43.32% of HLA-DR expression. Activated lymphocytes expressing CD40 Ligand showed stability until day 23. Activated Lymphocytes expressing CD69, CD25 and HLA-DR were stabilized in the same manner and stability could be achieved until day 16. Conclusion: This thesis was related to the preparation of control samples (IQA) designed to simulate whole blood having defined properties in clinical laboratory situations. In future kits can be developed with a low, medium and high control sample for the various immunological phenotypic determinants. Another kit can be compiled where various activation markers can be identified, quantified with a “zero”, low and high control. These whole blood IQA kits and “activation IQA kits” can be implemented for training of newly qualified staff, competency testing of staff, method development, software testing, panel settings and instrument setting testing. Control samples ideally must have a number of properties in order to be effective. For instance stability during storage times, preferably lasting more than a few weeks, reproducibility and ease of handling. These will provide the information on day-to-day variation of the technique or equipment which will enhance accuracy and improve patient care.
AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Inleiding: Vloeisitometrie tegnologie het verskeie tradisionele laboratorium toetse vervang as gevolg van beter akuraadheid, sensitiwiteit en vinniger beskikbaarheid van resultate in ‘n kliniese omgewing, veral kliniese proewe. Vloeisitometrie is ‘n kragtige tegniek om chemiese (fluorokroom byvoeging) en fisiese (sel grote en kompleksiteit) karakter eienskappe van individuele selle te meet. Met die toename in gebruik en gewildheid van hiedie instrumente, neem die behoefde toe vir gevorderde kwaliteit kontroles, gestandardiseerde prosedures, met profesionele toets programme tesame met metode ontwikkeling. Klein verstellings aan instrument parameters beinvloed die betroubaarheid, herhaalbaarheid en sensitiwiteit van ‘n sitometer en moet gemonitor (en dokumenteer) word om identiese kondisies van leesings op ‘n daaglikse basis te verseker. Dit kan bereik word deur in te skakel met ‘n interne kwaliteits versekerings program [IQA: “Internal Quality Control”] en/of ‘n eksterne kwaliteits versekerings program [EQA: “External Quality Control”] te volg. Op die oomblik is daar geen sulke kwaliteits versekerings programme in Suid Afrika en/of in die verarmende Afrika lande beskikbaar nie. MIV is ‘n wêreldwye bekommernis en laboratoriums en klinieke in hierdie gedeeltes van die land verlang ‘n dringende behoefdte vir sulke “IQA” programme om kwaliteit van instrumentasie en akkurate pasiënt resultate te verseker wat tot beter behandeling van pasiënte lei. Kwaliteit versekerings programme soos “CD Chex®” en “UK Nequas” is beskikbaar, maar baie probleme met verwysing na monster integriteit as gevolg van tydsame vervoer en aflewering kondisies word hiermee geassosieër. Die behoefte het ontstaan vir ‘n laboratorium in Suid Afrika wat direk die omliggende laboratoriums, hospitale en klinieke kan voorsien met gestabiliseerde blood monsters wat gebruik kan word as “IQA”. Die vervoer en aflewerings kondisies van hierdie monsters sal aansienlik verbeter as gevolg van die korter aflewerings afstand wat direk die beperkte temperatuur wisseling beinvloed. Doel van studie: Die doelwit van hoofstuk een is om vir die leser ‘n inleiding te gee tot terminologie en konsepte van immunologie en die immune sisteem. Hoofstuk twee beskyf die impak wat gestabiliseerde heelbloed het op die kliniese immunologie met betrekking tot kwaliteit beheer en kwaliteit versekering. Die doelwit van hierdie studie is om heelbloed te stabiliseer sodat die rakleeftyd meer as 30 dae is en sodoende as verwysings-materiaal kontroles vir Suid Afrikaanse immunofenotipering kan dien. Dit is ‘n verdere doelwit om hierdie tuis-gestabiliseerde kontrole monsters te gebruik as “IQA” verwysings materiaal in verarmende Afrika lande. Die doelwit van hoofstuk vier is om limfosiete te stimuleer om verskeie aktiverings merkers uit te druk op hul selmembrane en dan te stabiliseer en dié te gebruik as Kwaliteits Kontroles vir die meer gespesialiseerde immunologiese toetse. Studie ontwerp: Hoofstuk drie beskryf ‘n aangepaste en verbeterde metode van heel bloed stabiliseering. Stabiliteit word ondersoek in ‘n verskyndenheid konsentrasies van ‘n primêre stabiliseerings agent (chromium chloried heksahidraat) en inkubasie periodes met paraformaldehied as tweede stabiliseerings agent word deeglik gedokumenteer. Bloedmonsters van gesonde indiwidië (n=10) was gestabiliseer en gemonitor vir roetine MIV membraanoppervlak antigene oor ‘n periode van 40 dae. Hierdie monsters (n=10) was gelees en geanaliseer op ‘n BD FACSCalibur™ en vergelyk met ‘n BD FACSCount™ vloeisitometer instrument. Drie gestabiliseerde heelbloed monsters (n=3) was gemonitor vir ‘n periode vir so lank moontlik die fenotipiese selmembraan molekules identifiseerbaar was en die kwantiteit bepaalbaar was. Hierdie drie monsters was gemeet op beide instrumente. As ‘n addisionele doelwit, was hierdie drie gestabiliseerde monsters ondersoek om as moontlike kalibrasie materiaal (verteenwoordig ‘n normale bloedmonster) te dien vir die BD FACSCount™ instrument in die oggende voor pasiënt monsters gelees kan word. In hoofstuk vier was limfosiete geϊsoleer en geaktiveer met ‘n verskyndenheid stimulante om optimale aktiveerings-antigene uit te druk op T helper selmembrane (byvoorbeeld CD25, CD69, HLA-DR en CD40 Ligand). Hierdie geaktiveerde monsters was geanaliseer op die BD FACSCalibur™ en daarna gestabiliseer. Na stabilisasie van die geaktiveerde limfosiet monsters was dit gemonitor oor ‘n tydperk so lank moontlik data plotte leesbaar en selpopulasies identifiseerbaar was. Hierdie monsters kan dien as ‘n moontlike “IQA” toets stel vir ‘n meer gespesialiseerde immunologiese aktiveerings kontrole doeleindes. Resultate: In hoofstuk drie; tien individiële gestabiliseerde heelbloed monsters het gedui op geen-beduidende P waardes (P > 0.05) vir CD3, CD4 en CD8 persentasies en absolute waardes; gemeet vanaf DAG 3 vergelykbaar tot-en-met DAG 40. Met korrelasie statistiek en vergelyking van die BD FACSCalibur™ met die FACSCount™ instrumente, is die volgende opgemerk; R2 = 0.9848 vir die CD4 absolute waardes en ‘n R2 = 0.9636 vir die CD8 absolute waardes. Drie gestabiliseerde monsters (n=3) was gemonitor vir MIV roetine fenotipeering tot en met DAG 84. Die selpopulasies was duidelik identifiseerbaar en die kwantitatief meetbaar op albei instrumente (BD FACSCalibur™ en BD FACSCount™). Hoofstuk vier: geaktiveerde T helper lymphosiete het 25 – 35% membraan CD40 Ligand uitgedruk op hul selmembrane. Die stimulant van keuse was ionomysien teen ‘n optimale konsentrasie van 4μM. Die optimale inkubasie tydperk was vier ure by 37°C in 5% CO2 kondisie. Ses uur inkubasie in 4μM ionomysien by 37°C in ‘n 5% CO2 omgewing was optimal vir die CD69 selmembraan uitdrukking en het 84.21% opgelewer. Vir CD25 selmembraan uitdrukking was die selle vir ses ure met phietoheamagglutinin (PHA) gestimuleer by 37°C in 5% CO2 kondisie en het 43% CD25 selmembraan uitdrukking opgelewer. HLA-DR selmembraan uitdrukking: selle was vir ses ure saam met PHA by 37°C in 5% CO2 kondisie inkubeer en het 43.32% opgelewer. CD40 Ligand aktivering/gestabiliseerde limfosiete het tot en met dag 23 stabiliteit getoon. Die ligand was duidelik identifiseerbaar en kwantifiseerbaar. Geaktiveerde lymphosiete wat CD69, CD25 en HLA-DR selmembraan merkers uitdruk het na die stabiliseerings proses stabiliteit getoon tot-en-met dag 16. Gevolgtrekking: Die doel van hierdie studie was om verwysingskontroles voor te berei sodat dit vars heelbloed naboots met uitkenbare eienskappe vir kliniese situasies. ‘n Toets kontrolestel met verwysings materiaal vir drie vlakke (byvoorbeeld ‘n lae, medium en hoë kontrole) absolute selwaardes en persentasies kan voorberei word vir roetine immunologiese fenotiperings merkers (CD3/CD4/CD8/CD45). Meer gespesialiseerde kontrolestelle vir meer spesifieke doeleindes kan opgemaak word wat ‘n verskydenheid van limfosiet aktiveringsmerkers bevat met byvoorbeeld ‘n “nul”, lae en hoë verwysings kontrole daarin. Hierdie heelbloed kan dien as “aktiveerde interne kwaliteits verwysings materiaal” en kan gebruik word om nuut aangestelde laboratorium werkers en nuut gekwalifiseerde studente op te lei. Hierdie verwysings materiaal / kontroles kan aangewend word vir bevoegdheids doeleindes (byvoorbeeld vir SANAS akkreditasie doeleindes), vir metode ontwikkeling, vir sagteware toetsing, vir paneel opstelling en instrument verstellings doeleindes. Die kontroles moet ‘n verskydenheid eienskappe bevat om effektief te wees. Byvoorbeeld, stabiliteit tydens storing, gewenslik meer as ‘n paar weke, herhaalbaar en maklik handteerbaar. Hierdie kontroles sal inligting voorsien op ‘n daaglikse basis tydens wisseling van tegnieke of instrumentasie wat akuraatheid beinvloed en op die ou-end direk pasiënt versorging bevoordeel.

This thesis deals with the internal control concept according to the COSO Integrated Framework for Internal Controls. Internal control definition, objectives and components are reviewed and commented. The emphasis is put on the auditor's understanding the entity's internal control and his responsibility to identify and assess the risk of material misstatement in the financial statements.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
99
A number of financial scandals have caused our society pay a great amount of social costs, recently. Many researchers argue that one of the main reasons of these abuses happened is internal control weakness. As consequence, SOX404 promulgated in the US required companies have to evaluate the efficacy of internal control system every year, and have to provide valid financial reports based on this internal controls system. Also these reports need to be verified by certified public accountants. Our government also asks those public trading companies in Taiwan have to establish and execute well internal controls system. Moreover, board of directors should be verifying the functions of internal control are appropriate and effective. The purpose of this study is to examine whether there is a relationship between internal weakness and abnormal returns. Research samples are collected from Taiwanese IPOs from 2002 to 2009. As expected, we find that those IPOs with major control weakness accompany with higher abnormal returns. However, we find no evidence that the number of control weakness is correlative with abnormal returns.

碩士
國立雲林科技大學
會計系
107
This study examines the association between Financial Security Commission R.O.C. Securities and Futures Bureau’s (SFB’s) penalty for internal controls weakness and real earnings management in Taiwan. Firms with SFB’s penalty for internal controls weakness may have negative impacts on both their stock price and operating performance, which in turn, result in a violation of debt contract. It is expected that managers have incentives to improve earnings performance through real earnings manipulation in the SFB’s penalty for internal controls weakness case. This study hand-collects SFB’s penalty for internal controls weakness samples during 2006 to 2017 and examines whether SFB’s penalty for internal controls weakness results in the listed firm engaging in a higher real earnings management. The empirical results show that the listed firms have a higher degree of real earnings management when it is punished by the Financial Security Commission R.O.C. (Taiwan)Securities and Futures Bureau due to the internal controls weakness. This study conducts a battery of sensitivity tests and shows the results are robust to various specifications.

Internal control disclosures mandated by section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) are designed to provide information about a firm’s financial reporting quality and in doing so may offer information on firm-specific tax planning activities. Internal control weaknesses disclosed under SOX are frequently related to a firm’s tax function (Ge and McVay, 2005; Gleason, Pincus and Rego, 2010) and thus raise the question of whether or not these frequent problems affect corporate tax avoidance. In this thesis, I test hypotheses that tax-related disclosures, particularly those that contain company-level internal control weaknesses (ICWs), provide information with respect to long-run tax avoidance. Furthermore, I test hypotheses that the combination of internal control quality and aggressive tax avoidance aid in assessing shareholder returns. To conduct these tests, I collect and construct firm-level SOX disclosure data from 2004 to 2006 across 1,286 publicly-owned corporations. I begin with an empirical analysis of the association between tax avoidance and firm-level ICWs and generally find that the presence of tax ICWs and company-level tax ICWs constrain long-run tax avoidance. For firms with low cash constraints however, company-level tax ICWs appear to lead to an increase in tax avoidance. Nevertheless, subsequent analysis of monthly abnormal returns implies that the stock market reacts negatively to the disclosure of company-level tax ICWs, regardless of whether or not tax aggressiveness is also present. This thesis contributes to the literature by documenting the first evidence that internal control disclosures provide information regarding firm-level tax planning. Although the number of internal control weakness disclosures is decreasing over time, the availability of these SOX disclosures represents a previously unavailable opportunity to examine and further understand internal governance mechanisms within the firm and their influence on tax planning. In addition, this thesis further corroborates prior literature that argues for the importance of the pervasiveness of internal control weaknesses by showing that the pervasive, company-level tax internal control weaknesses are associated with tax avoidance and lower shareholder returns. Finally, my dissertation implies that the presence of tax internal control weaknesses constrains tax avoidance and thus a focus on improving internal controls could help improve the tax planning function. However, my firm-level analysis also implies that effective tax planning is a sustainable process and thus a firm and its stakeholders may require several periods before the full benefits of these improvements are realized.

碩士
國立雲林科技大學
會計系
107
This study hand-collects SFB’s penalty on a listed firm’s material internal controls weakness from 2006 to 2017 and uses event study approach to examine whether the stock price behaves negatively association with such penalty announcement. Note that ineffective internal control function weakens corporate governance, which in turn, may deteriorate the firm’s operating performance and earnings quality. This study expects the penalty firms’ stock price will negatively response SFB’s penalty announcement. The empirical results, as conjectured, support that this expectation. The abnormal returns, based on both the market index adjustment and the least squares method risk adjustment model, are negative and statistically significant in both the three (t-1~t+1) and five (t-2~t+2) observation period examinations. This study further divide the penalty into three subgroups: acquisition or disposal of assets, management of endorsement and guarantees, and others, in turn, examines whether abnormal return reveal differential patterns between this three types. The empirical results do not qualitatively change the initial findings.

This study investigates whether disclosures of material weaknesses in a firm’s internal control over financial reporting are associated with lower investor perceived earnings quality. I measure investor perceived earnings quality by a market returns based representation of earnings quality called e-loading developed by Ecker et al. (2006). My empirical tests use sample firms that disclosed at least one material weakness from August 2002 to October 2005. The cross-sectional univariate analysis shows that firms disclosing internal control material weaknesses have lower investor perceived earnings quality than matched firms that disclose no internal control problems. However, further cross-sectional multivariate regression analysis reveals that after controlling for firm characteristics, only disclosures of company-level material weaknesses have an incremental impact on investor perceived earnings quality, while disclosures of the less pervasive account-specific material weaknesses do not have a measurable effect on perceived earnings quality. From intertemporal within-firm analysis, I find no evidence that firms experienced a change in their perceived earnings quality after their first disclosure of internal control material weaknesses as per SOX 302 or 404. In contrast, I find that firms experienced an increase in perceived earnings quality after they received their first unqualified SOX 404 audit report indicating remediation of previously disclosed material weaknesses. This suggests that, although investors did not find the initial SOX disclosures of internal control weaknesses to be incrementally informative, the legislation motivated firms to remediate weak controls; moreover, the SOX-induced improvement in weak internal controls enhanced investors’ perception of the offending firms’ financial reporting quality.
Thesis (Ph.D, Management) -- Queen's University, 2009-12-17 11:41:11.323

碩士
國立臺北大學
會計學系
96
Societe Generale is one of the large-scale investment banks which occurs a heavy fraudulence at the beginning of 2008. Because of material weakness in internal control, Societe Generale has a €4.82 billion loss of misappropriation of asset. As a result, the effectiveness of internal control became a popular issue in the business field. In Taiwan, there are also some frauds like the Chinese Bank and Cosmos Bank. These cases perennially appear value of internal control, and internal control has been one important part of the corporate government. The research will analyze features of internal control in domestic banks and characters of fraud and examine the relationship among financial performance of banks and internal control effectiveness. First, we use five elements and twenty principles of Internal Control over Financial Reporting — Guidance for Smaller Public Companies to analyze banks of material weakness in internal control which have characteristic and feather. In order to understand what if relationship between financial performance of banks and internal control effectiveness. We class banks as two kinds of normal and abnormal and use variables of Central bank CAMELS Rating System to perform logistic regression module to examine correlation between material weakness in internal control and the quality of financial performance. Based on the study, most banks involved in fraudulent activities are suffered from misappropriation of assets. The main reason is improper design of internal control、element of control activities and supervision are inactive especially；The weakness of fraud is that element of internal environment and risk assessment have not affected. We select four domestic banks as samples to find out what elements lead to material weakness in internal control system and give some recommends to improve. Through logistic regression module, we find out that there is a positive correlation between failed internal control and the quality of financial performance. Under Central bank CAMELS Rating System, the abnormal banks usually have poor assets quality、failing profitability、net loss、mouldering performance and blue-sky financial structure. Normal banks have not this phenomenon.

碩士
國立臺北大學
會計學系
101
For recent years, frequent major economic events at home and abroad , resulting in huge losses of social and investors, such as Baring, Enron and WorldCom. These cases perennially appear value of internal control. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the relationship between domestic commercial banks' internal controls and performance. The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between material weakness of internal control and corporate performance. The sample period is from 2009 to 2011, and the significant penalties cases on the Financial Supervisory Commission, Executive Yuan, R.O.C. website are identified as a proxy for material weakness of internal control of listed banks. To understand the relationship between material weakness of internal control and performance. In order to understand material weakness of domestic commercial banks' internal controls, this study first analyzes the 2009-2011 penalties, including the total amount from the penalty, penalty times and violate regulations. Based on the study, when the bank was fined due to internal control weakness its operating performance was poor than the bank which was not punished. Additionally, this study investigate the relationship between internal control weakness and turnover of chairman of the board and general manager. The empirical results show when the bank general manager was turnover , the banks' internal controls weakness opportunities higher than the bank general manager wasn’t turnover.

碩士
國立中興大學
會計學研究所
106
According to the proir literatures, the cost stickiness comes from the manager’s decision-making, and the value of financial flexibility reflects cash holding and the financial status of the firm which will influence manager’s adjustment resources decisions. This study examines the relationship between cost stickiness and the value of financial flexibility. A firm’s managerial power directly influences manager’s the adjustment of SG&A resources and decision-making. Moreover, firms with better corporate governance structures are able to suppress the cost stickiness caused by the empire-building incentives. Therefore, we consider the moderating effect of the above relationship of CEO power and the material internal control weakness. The empirical results find that firms with high value of financial flexibility will have a high cost stickiness behavior when the single-period sales decrease. And they will have a high cost anti-stickiness behavior when the two-period sales decrease. In other words, financial flexibility has a positive relationship with both cost-stickiness and anti-stickiness. Analyzing the managerial power of firms, it finds that when the single-period sales decrease, the greater the power of the company’s CEO will not affect the relationship between the financial flexibility’s value and the cost-stickiness; but when the two-period sales decrease, the greater CEO power and financial flexibility’s value will reduce cost anti-stickiness. We further consider the quality of internal control and find that the firms without material internal control weakness but with greater CEO power have no influence on the relationship between cost-stickiness and anti-stickiness. However, firms with material internal control weakness and greater CEO power will affect the positive relationship between financial flexibility and cost-stickiness when the single-period sales decrease. And they will not affect the relationship among cost anti-stickiness, financial flexibility’s value and CEO power under the two-period sales decrease.

碩士
國立臺灣大學
會計學研究所
99
This paper investigates whether the use of large accounting firms and the corporate governance mechanisms play important roles in helping small public firms speed up the remediation of material weaknesses (MWs) under Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) section 404 reporting requirements. Compared with large firms, small companies are more likely to have internal control deficiencies, constrained by financial resources, lack the experienced personnel to perform the SOX-related work, and are hard to allure individuals to serve as independent directors. What’s more, large accounting firms also stopped engaging with small clients due to lack of profitability and risk concern. To date, small firms are exempted from SOX section 404(b) internal control audit requirement. These differences motivate me to examine the effects of Big 4 auditor choice and corporate governance on MWs remediation. Since December 15, 2007, non-accelerated filers have been required to comply with SOX 404(a). I collect data on 56 non-accelerated filers that first disclosed at least one MW from December 15, 2007 to January 15, 2008 under SOX 404(a) and then trace these firms for two more consecutive years. I determine firms’ timeliness in the remediation of MWs on the basis of how fast the firms fully remediate their MWs. The results from ordered logistic regression indicate that firms with Big 4 auditors, more audit committee members are more likely to remediate MWs in a timely manner. However, firms with more severe MWs, auditor changes subsequent to the detection of MWs, and more complex operation may impede the remediation.

碩士
國立臺北大學
會計學系
103
In order to enhance Firms’ internal quality, SOX302 and SOX 404 were issued by U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which acquired Firms to prepare internal control reports and the opinions by the auditors. In Taiwan, we have “Internal control systems established standards for Public Offering Firms” issued by Securities and Futures Bureau, Financial Supervisory Commission, R.O.C. as supervising these firms to establish the internal control systems. We can improve the corporate governance quality to enhance the internal control quality. Besides, we also can improve the internal control quality by designing the managers’ incentive compensation. Due to the substitution effect of corporate governance and managers’ compensation on the internal control quality, the purpose of this study is to discuss the effect of internal control material weaknesses by both sides. The result shows that firms with higher corporate governance quality have the lower relationship between managers’ incentive compensation and internal control quality. Thus, in order to improve internal control quality, firms can either choose to establish well supervisory system or offer the incentive of compensation to CEO.

碩士
國立中正大學
會計與資訊科技研究所
102
This study examines the relationship between analyst coverage and internal control problems. The primary issue is whether analyst coverage will mitigate internal control problem under Section 404 of Sarbanes- Oxley Act. We find firms with analyst coverage have less internal control weakness than those without it. Besides, the negative association between analyst coverage and internal control. In other words, the internal control weakness is negative with the extent of analyst coverage for firms being followed. Finally, we introduce analysts’ characteristics to test further and find analysts, having more experience on firms, working more years as analysts, and being hired by large broker, are more likely to enhance the effective internal control. Collectively, analysts have monitor effect on internal control.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
103
Abstract Graduate Institute of Accounting Fu Jen Catholic University Title of Thesis：C.P.A. Discipline and Internal Control Weakness Name of Student：Huang, Kaochin-Chin Advisor：Dr. Fan, Hung-Shu Total Pages：85 pages Month/Year：07/2015 Key Words：CPA Discipline, Internal Control Weakness Abstract： This study aims to explore the effect of CPA discipline on the internal control werkness (hereafter, ICW). The sample of this study consists of TSE- listed and OTC-listed companies from year 2006 to 2013. The empirical results are as follows: 1. There is a significant-positive relationship between the Main CPA discipline dummy variable and ICW dummy variable, which indicates that the firms with the Main CPA being disciplined are more likely to incur ICW. 2. There is a significant-positive relationship between the Secondary CPA discipline dummy variable and ICW dummy variable, which indicates that the firms with the Secondary CPA being disciplined are more likely to incur ICW. 3. There is a significant-positive relationship between the Main or Secondary CPA discipline dummy variable and ICW dummy variable, which indicates that the firms with the Main or Secondary CPA being disciplined are more likely to incur ICW. In this study, several sensitivity tests are performed, including replacing ICW dummy variable with the fines and the frequency of the penalty due to weak internal control tests, and dividing sample into electronics and non-electronics subsample tests. The results of the sensitivity tests are similar to the previous empirical results.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
104
This study aims to examine the effect of Female Directors (hereafter, F&D) on the internal control werkness (hereafter, ICW). The sample of this study consists of TSE-listed companies, OTC-listed companies from year 2008 to 2014. The empirical result of this study shows that there is significant-positive relationship between F&D ratio and the fine of ICW. It means that the board of directors has more female directors, the more chance of ICW will occur. This study performs several sensitivity tests, included replacing the fines of ICW with ICW dummy variable/the number of ICW tests. The empirical results of these sensitivity tests are similar to the previous empirical results. Finaly, this study find that significant-positive relationship between F&D ratio and the ICW variable is only found in the electronic subsample and family companies subsample.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
105
This study aims to examine the effect of the book-tax difference and the internal control werkness ((hereafter, ICW). The sample of this study consists of TSE-listed companies, OTC-listed companies in Taiwan from year 2010 to 2016. The empirical result of this study shows that there is a significant-positive relationship between the absolute value of the book-tax difference and ICW fines variable, which indicates the lower the absolute value of the book-tax difference is, the less fines of ICW . In this study, several sensitivity tests are performed, including dividing the book-tax difference into positive and negative book-tax difference. When the firm with positive book-tax difference, there is a significant-positive relationship between the positive book-tax difference and the ICW fines, which means that the lower positive book-tax difference is, the less fines of ICW. When the firm with negative book-tax difference, there is a significant- negative relationship between the negative book-tax difference and the ICW fines. The empirical results of these sensitivity tests are similar to the previous empirical results.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
101
This study aims to explore the relation between the internal control and corporate governance. The sample firms include firms listed on the Taiwan Security Exchange Corporation and GreTai Securities Market in Taiwan during 2006-2012. Furthermore, this study uses the penalty cases of internal control weakness announced by the Financial Supervisory Commission to proxy internal control weakness. The empirical result shows that the dummy variable for internal control weakness is significantly negative-related with corporate governance. It means that good corporate governance can ehance the effectiveness of the internal control system that prevents the occurence of the internal control weakness. This study conducts several sensitivity tests, including replacing the internal control weakness variable by the amount of the penalty due to weak internal control, the frequency of the penalty due to weak internal control test, including other control variables. The empirical results of several sensitivity tests show that the conclusion of the above-mentioned does not alter.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
105
The main purpose of this study is to examine the relation between the internal control weakness and the book-tax difference. These companies with internal control weakness will have more book-tax difference. The sample of this study consists of firms listed on the Taiwan Security Exchange Corporation and Gretai Securities Market in Taiwan during 2004-2015. The empirical results show that the dummy variable of internal control weakness is significantly positive-related with book-tax difference. Finally, this study conducts several sensitivity analyses to strengthen the main empirical results of this study.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
106
This study aims to examine the relation between Internal Control Weakness and the Analysts' Earnings Forecasts. The sample consists of listed firms in Taiwan. The empirical results of this study show that firms with internal control weakness have greater analysts' earnings forecasts error and dispersion than those without internal control weakness. This study performs several sensitivity tests, included replacing internal control weakness dummy variable with the number of internal control weakness and the fines of internal control weakness tests, propensity score matching test, and measuring the analysts' earnings forecasts error with mean value instead of median value. The empirical results of these sensitivity tests are similar to the main empirical results.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
106
Abstract： This study aims to explore the relationship between key audit matters and the internal control weakness. The sample of this study consists of Taiwan listed firms disclosing key audit matters in 2016. The empirical results shows that the item counts of key audit matters of firms with more internal control weakness are higher than that of firms without internal control weakness. This study conducts a number of sensitivity tests. The sensitivity tests include (1) replacing the number of internal control weakness with the fines of internal control weakness, (2) replacing the number of internal control weakness with internal control weakness dummy variable, (3) replacing the item counts of key audit matters with the word counts of key audit matters. The empirical results of these sensitivity tests are similar to the main test.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
103
Abstract Graduate Institute of Accounting Fu Jen Catholic University Title of Thesis：Internal Control Weakness and Cost of Debt Name of Student：Chen,Li-Fang Advisor：Dr. Fan, Hung-Shu Total Pages：74 pages Month/Year：07/2015 Key Words：Internal Control Weakness, Cost of Debt Abstract： This study aims to examine the effect of the internal control werkness (hereafter, ICW) on the cost of debt. The sample of this study consists of TSE- listed companies, OTC-listed companies from year 2006 to 2013. The empirical result of his study shows that there is significant-positive relationship between the cost of debt and ICW dummy variable. It means that the companis with internal control weakness have higher cost of debt than companies with good internal control. There are some additional sensitivity tests conducted in the study. They include replacing ICW dummy variable with the fines and the frequency of the penalty due to weak internal control tests, dividing sample into electronic industries and non- electronic industries subsamplesa tests, and dividing sample into TSE-listed and OTC-listed subsamplesa tests. The empirical results of these sensitivity tests, except for OTC-listed subsample, are similar to the previous empirical results.

碩士
國立東華大學
會計與財務碩士學位學程
105
This study selects a sample of Taiwanese electronic firms from 2010 to 2014 to investigate the impact of internal control weakness (ICW) on CEO media exposure. Empirical evidences show that firms with more internal control weakness experience higher CEO media exposure and results remain consistent when using an alternative measure of media exposure considering media tone. This implies that CEOs are concerned with their reputation in the media so they will take action when facing negative events such as the reveal of internal control weakness. This study further finds that firms with good corporate governance will mitigate ICW-CEO media exposure relationship, compared to those companies with poor corporate governance. Similarly, the results of this study also reveal that family firm would not allow CEOs to overly expose in the media for possible impression management when occurring internal control weakness, compared to non-family firms.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
103
The study aims to examine the influence of different types of institutional investors on the internal control weakness (hereafter, ICW). The sample of this study consists of TSE-listed and OTC-listed companies from 2006 to 2013 in Taiwan. The empirical results are as follows: 1. There is a significant-positive relationship between speculative institutional investors (ie. institutional investors with low shareholding & high turnover rate) and ICW. It reveals that the companies with speculative institutional investors are more likely to occur ICW. 2. There is an insignificant-negative relationship between long-term institutional investors (ie. institutional investors with high shareholding & low turnover rate) and ICW. This study also conducts some sensitivity tests, including replacing ICW dummy variable with the fines and the frequency of the penalty for ICW tests, the empirical results of the sensitivity tests are similar to the results of the main test. The subsamples tests show that the results of the main test are only hold for electronics industry and TSE-listed companies.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
102
This study aims to explore the relation between the internal control weakness and auditor’s industry specialization. This study conjectures that the likelihood of internal control weakness of listed firms is significantly negative -related to auditor’s industry specialization. The sample consists of firms listed on the Taiwan Security Exchange Corporation and GreTai Securities Market in Taiwan during 2006-2012. Furthermore, this study uses client number-based market share to measure the auditor’s industry-specialization. The empirical result shows that the dummy variable for internal control weakness is significantly negative-related with auditor’s industry-specialization. It means that industry-specialization auditor can enhance the effectiveness of the internal control system that prevents the occurence of the internal control weakness. This study conducts several sensitivity tests, including replacing ICW dummy variable with the fines and the frequency of the penalty due to weak internal control tests, using aiternative auditor’s industry-specialization test. The results of the sensitivity tests conform to the previous empirical results.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
101
The purpose of this study is to examine the relation between the internal control weakness and the book-tax difference. Following Chen and Tsai (2006), this study estimates taxable income by income tax expense divided by the appropriate tax rate. The sample of this study consists of listed firms during 2006-2012. The firms with the internal control weakness are listed and OTC companies published due to weak internal control by the Securities and Futures Bureau of Financial Supervisory Commission. The empirical result shows that the internal control weakness is significantly positive-related to the book-tax difference. This study performs several additional tests including replacing the weak internal control variable by the amount of the penalty due to weak internal control, the frequency of the penalty due to weak internal control tests, and adding year dummies variables, the electronics industry subsample test. The empirical results of these additional tests are consistent with the main test results.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
101
The study aims to explore the effect of internal control weakness on the financial report lag. The sample firms include firms listed on the Taiwan Security Exchange Corporation and GreTai Securities Market in Taiwan during 2006-2012. Furthermore, this study uses the penalty cases of internal control weakness announced by the Financial Supervisory Commission to proxy internal control weakness. The empirical results show that financial report lags are significantly positive-related with internal control weakness. We can conclude that financial report lags of firms with worse internal control are longer than that of firms with better internal control. This study conducts several sensitivity tests, including replacing the internal control weakness variable by the amount of the penalty due to weak internal control, the frequency of the penalty due to weak internal control test and replacing audit change by audit firm change test etc. The empirical results of these sensitivity analyses are consistent with the main test results.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
101
The purpose of this study is to examine the association between internal control weakness and real earnings management. The empirical sample consists of TWSE /GTSM listed companies from 2006 to 2012. Following Cohen and Zarowin (2010), this study combines the three measures in Roychowdhury (2006) (i.e. abnormal cash flow in operating activities, abnormal discretionary expense and abnormal production cost) into one comprehensive index and then take the absolute value to measure the extent of firms’ real earnings management. The empirical result of this study shows that the real earnings management is significantly positive-related with the internal control weakness dummy variable. That is, compared with the companies without internal control weakness, the companies with internal control weakness conduct more real earnings management activities. This study performs several additional tests and gains similar results.

碩士
國立臺北大學
會計學系
99
The financial scandals of banks has happened recently which may due to improper internal controls, integrity problem of the Managers, and inadequate internal audit, etc. These issues drew my attention to research the value of internal control, which is important part of the corporate governance. In order to understand what is the relationship between firm performance and internal control weakness.The banks are classified into two categories by five elements of COSO Report. On the other hand, Using variables of Central Bank CAMELS Rating System perform A logistic regression module to examine correlation between material weakness in internal control and the quality of firm performance. Through this method, we found out that there is inverse correlation between internal control weakness and the quality of firm performance. Keywords：Internal Control、Firm Performance、Corporate Governance

碩士
國立中正大學
會計與資訊科技研究所
100
This study examines the relation between value of cash and internal control weakness. Using material internal control weakness reports under Sarbanes-Oxley 404, I find that firms occurring material weakness in internal control are generally associated with lower value of cash holding. I further find that the relation is stronger for the internal control problems associated with entity-level than ones associated with account-level. Moreover, the value of cash will be increase after firms has a qualified remediation on the internal control deficiency. I find similar results employing an alternative measure of value of cash, and the results are robust to controlling for potential endogeneity concerns.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
103
This study aims to examine the effect of related party transaction on the internal control weakness (ICW). The sample of this study consists of publicly listed companies from year 2006 to 2013. The empirical result of this study evidence that related party transaction variable is significantly positive correlated with internal control weakness dummy variable, showing more related party transactions can cause more internal control weakness. Furthermore, this study conducts some sensitivity tests, including replacing internal control weakness dummy variable by fines of internal control weakness and number of internal control weakness tests, electronic/ non-electronic subsamples tests, and TSE-listed /OTC-listed subsamples tests. These empirical results of subsamples tests evidence that the positive correlation between related party transaction variable and the internal control weakness variable is only found in the non-electronic subsample and TSE-listed subsample.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
104
This study aimsto explore the effect of internal control weakness on the assets impairment induced by earnings management.The sample of this study consists of firms listed on the Taiwan Security Exchange Corporation and Gretai Securities Market in Taiwan during 2005-2015. The empirical results are as follows: 1. Some part of assets impairment is indeed induced by earnings management, including taking a big bath, income smoothing, IPO and management change. 2. The firms with more fines due to internal control weaknesshavemore assets impairments induced by taking a big bath or management change. 3. This study also conducts a number of sensitivity tests and gains similar empirical results.

碩士
國立雲林科技大學
會計系
104
Internal control system is related to a firm’s risk management decision and corporate governance mechanism. Prior studies indicate that firms revealed internal control deficiencies have lower accruals quality. A well-designed internal control system can strengthen the reliability of the firms’ financial position, which in turn, enhances the users’ confidence toward financial reports of the firms. Institutional investors are more capable of analyzing financial data to protect their magnitude of wealth invested (Velury & Jenkins, 2006). The penalty of internal control weakness is likely to be more concerned by the institutional investors. Thus, this study is motivated to examine whether a penalty of internal control weakness is associated with institutional ownership decisions. The empirical result supports the hypothesis: The penalties of firms with internal control weakness result in a decreasing pattern of institutional investors’ ownership. Further evidence reveals that ownership of both qualified foreign institutional investors and domestic institutional investors decreased for firms with penalty of internal control weakness. This study implements some diagnostic checks and demonstrates that our results are robust to various specifications.

碩士
元智大學
財務金融暨會計碩士班(會計學程)
106
The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between internal control weakness and corporate performance in United States companies of all industry types. This research consists of two stages. First, the operational efficiency of all companies was measured using a Charnes, Cooper and Rhoder (1978) (CCR) model for data envelope analysis (DEA). Second, this paper adopts ordinary least squares (OLS) regression analysis to explore the influence of internal control weakness on corporate performance. Our final sample included 14,104 samples. The sample period was from 2013-2016. The empirical results show that the seven categories of internal control weakness and the number of times/incidents of internal control weakness in the above stated period have significant negative influences on corporate performance. This means that the more times internal control weakness occurred, the worse the corporate performance.

碩士
輔仁大學
會計學系碩士班
103
This study aims to examine the effect of directors and Supervisors liability insurance (hereafter, D&S) on the internal control werkness (hereafter, ICW). The sample of this study consists of TSE-listed companies, OTC-listed companies from year 2006 to 2013. The empirical result of his study shows that there is significant-positive relationship between D&S and the fine of ICW. It means that the company insures more liability for their directors and Supervisors, the more chance of ICW will occur. This study performs several sensitivity tests, included replacing the fines of ICW dummy variable with ICW dummy variable, the number of ICW tests. The empirical results of these sensitivity tests are similar to the previous empirical results. Finaly, this study find that the positive correlation between D&S and the ICW variable is only found in the non-electronic subsample.

碩士
國立中正大學
會計與資訊科技研究所
104
Abstract Due to the growth of the stock market in Taiwan, the impact on the investing market is significant. In recent years, many stock listed companies break out financial fraud, environmental violations and public safety events. As a result, Taiwan Stock Exchange and Taipei Exchange examinedthe applicationsstrictly, and put more emphasis on the effectiveness of internal control. The implementation of such control demands significant resource and time and the scope of controls are broad. Many companies wishing to IPO comply with the regulatory bodies however the effectiveness of such controls are not available to the market. As a result, this research is done through the perspective of professional Auditors to consolidate relevant regulations, focus points of regulatory bodies, this research also includes common examples of fraud, failure of internal control and recommendations in the manufacturing sector. This serves as a guide for companies wishing to IPO self-assess the effectiveness of their internal control procedures and make improvements. This research effectively reduces the structuring of internal control for companies in the stages of applying for IPO. Keyword： Internal Control、IPO、Internal Control Weakness and Deficiency

碩士
國立雲林科技大學
會計系
104
This study examines the relationship between related party transactions (RPTs) and internal control weakness. This study hypothesizes that the attributes and complicated characteristics of related party transactions will increase the possibility of the occurrence of internal control weakness. This study uses three types of RPTs (sales-related, non-sales related, and lending and borrowing related) to test this hypothesis. The empirical results document that both the magnitude non-sales related RPTs and lending and borrowing related RPTs are positively associated with the occurrence of internal control weakness. However, the association between sales-related RPTs and internal control weakness is statistically insignificant. This study also conducts some sensitivity test, e.g., before and after the global financial crisis test, electronics and non-electronics industries test, and indicates the findings are robust in these setting. However, the further examinations show that the moderating role of audit committee and institutional investors are unlikely effects in the analysis.

碩士
國立東華大學
會計與財務碩士學位學程
105
This study investigates the relationship between the CFO's qualifications and a firm’s internal control weakness, the association between internal control weakness and CFO’s turnover, and explores the impact of a new CFO on improvement on internal control. Using a sample from Taiwanese listed firms from 2012 to 2015, several important findings emerge. First, I find that CFO qualifications are negatively associated with the number of internal control weaknesses, implying qualified CFOs can effectively implement good internal control system. Second, CFO’s turnover is positively associated with internal control weakness, meaning that internal control weaknesses increase the likelihood of CFO turnover. Third, hiring a new CFO may not improve a firm’s internal control. The results of this study provide managerial implications on how to improve internal control. Keywords: CFO's qualifications、internal control weakness、CFO’s turnover

碩士
中原大學
會計研究所
99
Financial statement frauds, embezzlements of assets and bankruptcy cases have increasingly grown in recent years. The reason is that most of these companies do not implement effective internal controls. In order to enforce internal control system on companies further and keep it working effectively, Taiwan Stock Exchange Corporation (TWSE) and Taiwan Gre Tai Securities Market (GTSM) required in 1997 that those listed and OTC companies should perform self-assessment on their internal control and prepare internal control report for CPA-auditing. Internal control report should be submitted yearly and published in the annual report and the prospectus. Consequently, CPA plays an important role in assessing the effectiveness of internal control. Just like CPA, credit rating agencies play a similar role in the effectiveness assessment. This study therefore aims to investigate whether the credit risk grade will affect the occurrence of internal control weakness or not. This study also explores account-level weakness and firm-level weakness to see the influence of credit risk grade on the different types of internal control weakness. As the empirical results show, credit risk rating is significantly positive correlated with the disclosure of internal control weakness. The outcome indicates that when credit rating agencies rate a good grade on a company, the company also tends to supervise its internal control more seriously, thereby reducing the probability of internal control weakness. In addition, the study also finds that no matter how the internal control weakness is classified, the probability of serious weakness occurred in the internal control can be much reduced if agencies rate a good grade on the company.

碩士
逢甲大學
會計學系
106
This study is based on the listed cabinet companies in Taiwan from 2012 to 2015. The research sources are based on the results of the corporate governance evaluation released by the FSC, while the missing data on internal control are taken from the TEJ (Taiwan Economic Newspaper Database) " Crisis Company Events "module to explore the relationship between corporate governance evaluation and internal control weakness. First of all, the empirical results show that when the company carries out the corporate governance evaluation, it will reduce the occurrence of internal control weakness and the number of times, obviously, when the company carries out the corporate governance evaluation, which will reduce the incidence of internal control weakness. Second, to further explore whether the better corporate governance evaluation will reduce the number of occurrences and the number of internal control weakness. The empirical results show that the better the corporate governance evaluation, the less the frequency of internal control weakness will appear, the better the corporate governance evaluation and the lower the incidence of internal control weakness The results of this study can be used as a reference for the competent authorities and relevant stakeholders in making relevant important decisions.