NEWS ANALYSIS: Life will never be the same again for SA’s auditing profession
Last Friday, life changed not just for KPMG but for every audit firm in SA. Any temptation the other three major audit firms — PwC, EY and Deloitte — may have to celebrate KPMG’s woes will be short-lived. It will be curbed by the realisation that the 11-page summary of KPMG International’s findings into the Gupta scandal reads like something the Independent Regulatory Body for Auditors (Irba) would have crafted to promote audit firm rotation. On Friday, thanks to KPMG, Irba won the long-running mandatory rotation argument. Mandatory rotation will certainly not serve the purposes of any of the big four audit firms. But it may serve the interests of shareholders who rely on external auditors being sufficiently independent to safeguard the integrity of corporate accounts. South African audit firms must also realise the days of light-touch oversight and the easy presumption of the integrity of auditors have ended. Not only is mandatory rotation on the cards for 2023, audit firms will no...
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