Across 262 Thai-listed nonfinancial firms and 1,492 firm-years from 2016-2021, longer joint tenure between the engagement audit partner and CFO was positively associated with audit fees, including within-firm changes. The pattern may reflect client-specific knowledge, complexity or bargaining, but does not establish improved audit quality.
Key findings
- Longer tenure was associated with higher fees, concentrated among non-ESG100, lower-leverage, non-loss, no-foreign-subsidiary, economically important and non-Big 4 engagements. Within-firm tenure increases were also associated, becoming more visible after multiple years.
Why this matters globally
The partner-CFO level evidence adds an emerging-market perspective to global debates on rotation, familiarity and auditor independence.
Thai researcher contribution
Chulalongkorn University researchers moved analysis from audit-firm tenure to the actual signing-partner-CFO relationship in Thailand.
Limitations to consider
Observational selection and reverse causality remain: complex clients may retain the same pair and pay more. Fees do not directly measure effort, quality or independence. First differences do not remove all endogeneity, and Thai rules may differ elsewhere.