EXTERNAL AUDITORS' ATTRIBUTES AND CORPORATE INCOME SMOOTHING PRACTICES AMONG LISTED NON-FINANCIAL FIRMS IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

This study evaluated the relationship between external auditors’ attributes and corporate income smoothing practices among listed non-financial firms in Sub-Saharan African countries. The study employed the ex-post facto and descriptive research designs. The sources of the data were secondary sources generated from audited financial reports and accounts of selected non-financial firms listed on the Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania, Zimbabwe Stock Exchanges and the Nigerian Exchange Group between 2013 and 2022. Using the homogenous purposive sampling technique, two hundred and ninety-nine (299) listed non-financial firms were selected from Stock Exchanges of Ghana; Kenya; Nigerian Exchange Group; South Africa; Tanzania and Zimbabwe. The independent variables employed for the study were External Auditors’ Firm Type, External Auditors’ Audit Report Lag, External Auditors’ Fees, External Auditors’ Tenure and Joint Audit. The dependent variable was proxied by Eckel 1981 corporate income smoothing Model while Firm Size and Return on Total Assets were employed as control variables. The panel data were analyzed with the aid of Pooled OLS techniques using version 14 of Stata statistical software to conduct the descriptive statistics, correlation, and regression analyses. The study found that: Audit Firm Type (XATYPE, coef. 1.572 {0.028}) has a statistically significant and positive effect on corporate income smoothing practices among listed non-financial firms in Sub-Saharan Africa. External Audit Report Lag (XARLAG, coef. -0.0009{0.815}) did not show any statistically significant effect on corporate income smoothing practices of listed non-financial firms in Sub-Saharan Africa. External Audit Fee (XAFEE, coef. -0.523 {0.000}) indicated a statistically significant but negative effect on corporate income smoothing practices among listed non-financial firms in Sub-Saharan African. External Audit Tenure (XATEN, coef. -4.117 {0.048}) has a statistically significant and negative effect on corporate income smoothing practices among listed non-financial firms in Sub-Saharan Africa. Joint Audit Practices (JAUDIT, coef. -3.113 {0.197}) has no statistically significant effect on corporate income smoothing practices among listed non-financial firms in Sub-Saharan Africa. Based on the above findings, the study concluded that external audit methodologies and procedures may not be designed to effectively detect corporate income smoothing in the six economies under study, especially if external audit firms are not keeping up evolving accounting practices and financial engineering techniques prevalent in the region under study. Hence the theory of audit quality in mitigating earnings smoothing may not always be valid especially in the six selected Sub-Saharan African economies. Hence, this study recommended that: Regulators of the audit market should reduce the over concentration of Big Four audit firms in Sub-Saharan African economies by enacting policies that will encourage second tier audit firms in the African Stock Exchanges to step up the quality of their audit services to compete favorably with their Big Four counterparts. Also, external audit tenure system can be an effective strategy for improving external audit quality and curbing corporate income smoothing practices among the selected six economies under study in line with the Economic Consequences Theory which sternly cautions managers of listed non-financial firms in Sub-Saharan African economies against the negative consequences of corporate income smoothing practices such as loss of investor trust and confidence, higher borrowing costs, regulatory scrutiny and damage to firm’s reputation.