The Materiality of Corporate Governance Report Disclosures: Investigating the Perceptions of External Auditors working in Egypt

Abstract

This study investigates the external auditors working in Egypt perceptions regarding the materiality of the corporate governance report (CGR) disclosures. All external auditors working in Egypt were surveyed to determine whether disclosures are materially important to this group while they are performing their audits. The final sample consists of 247 auditors who work in Big 4 auditing firm, private auditing firms affiliated to foreign auditing firms, private auditing firm not affiliated to foreign auditing firm and governmental auditors. Through hypotheses testing the main findings reveal that all external auditors perceive CGR disclosures as materially important. Moreover, there was significant difference in some of their perceptions, these differences were explained through psychological engagement (i.e., experience, educational level, and work exposure) throughout the analysis. The findings show that respondents consider information related to internal control, governance and compliance to laws and regulations to be significantly material in auditing decision. While information regarding transparency and disclosure were the less important when compared to other sections of the CGR. The current study extends and enriches the ongoing academic and practical debate on the usefulness of narrative disclosures. The study findings suggest that regulators should seek more communications to the current requirements as the results shows that direct knowledge of the auditors made a big difference in their perceptions. The current investigation touched a blind spot in the literature and provided evidence for the materiality level of CGR disclosure in auditing decision, as previous studies investigated how governance report affect the firm value.