외부감사가 부채조달비용에 미친 효과 - 상장기업과 비상장기업의 비교를 중심으로 -

In this study, we examine the association between audit quality and cost debt capital using 15,565 firm/year following “Act on External Audit of Stock Companies” that filed their audit fee to Financial Supervisory Services(FSS) from 2005 to 2007. As proxies of audit quality, we use expected audit fee, audit fee scaled by the sum of audit fee vested to each auditor and auditor type. Our empirical findings are as follows; First, we find that if audit fees of specific firm take larger portion in total audit fees vested to each auditor(meaning more value of client-specific collateral), financial information is perceived as more reliable and capital providers charge lower cost of debt capital. This implies that auditors provide higher audit quality for the auditee with higher value of firm-specific quasi-rent in order to maintain their reputation. Second, we find that firms engaging with big 4(or 5) auditors save the cost of debt capital for private firms. This implies that if reputable auditors want to maintain quasi rents from current auditees, it is important not to lose their reputation from poor audit quality. Also, we may interpret that capital providers highly appreciate private firms which engage with big 4(or 5) auditors because they have less information publicly available compared with listed market and put more value to reputable auditor. From findings, we suggest that benefit of external audit strongly exist in private market. Also, our results imply that, in order to save the cost of debt capital, manager of private firms need to recognize the important role of external audit. Finally, for regulators, we may suggest that positive effects of external audit in private market can be used as the ground that mandatory external audit for private firms.