اثربخشی حاکمیت شرکتی داخلی و کیفیت حسابرسی: نقش تمرکز مالکیت – شواهد مالزیایی The effectiveness of internal corporate governance and audit quality: the role of ownership concentration – Malaysian evidence

1. Introduction Audit is the cornerstone of corporate governance (Cadbury, 1992). However, its efficiency depends on the actuality and development of the corporate governance environment (Holm and Laursen, 2007). Good corporate governance has enticing properties, demanding a high level of audit quality by company managers (Lin and Liu, 2009). Fan and Wong (2005) confirm that companies demand a high level of audit quality to enhance their governance. Nevertheless, national differences in ownership structure could make companies’ governance more flexible and responsive to local features. This variety in corporate governance and how corporate governance is conceptualised are still hotly debated (Aguilera and Jackson, 2003; Gedajlovic and Shapiro, 2002; Desender et al., 2013; O’Sullivan, 2000; Shleifer and Vishny, 1997). Aguilera and Jackson (2003) state that the degree of ownership concentration (OC) increases the external pressures on management, while diffused ownership reassures the shareholder voice. Corporate governance is defined as a set of interrelated mechanisms that has strategic or institutional complementarities to align the conflict of interests between principals and agents; this is dependent on certain combinations, including ownership structure (Aguilera et al., 2008; Desender et al., 2013). Ownership structure plays a major role in the effectiveness of corporate governance mechanisms, where OC could mitigate or exacerbate agency problems that affect governance (Setia-Atmaja, 2009). Shleifer and Vishny (1986) state that the controlling shareholders have more incentives and power to monitor the company’s managers, contributing to the reduction of agency problems. However, Shleifer and Vishny (1997) argue that major shareholders could expropriate the wealth of minority shareholders in concentrated ownership settings. Different governance mechanisms are applied to monitor agents and shareholders, such as external auditors, where the external auditor provides a significant monitoring role in testing the credibility of financial statements provided by management on behalf of the shareholders (Lin and Liu, 2009; Watts and Zimmerman, 1983). Malaysia is an interesting case for studying the role of corporate governance in demanding audit quality because of the dominance of blockholders in listed companies. Malaysian listed companies, with their ownership concentrated in families, individuals and the government, are thus differentiated from their Western counterparts (Hasnan et al., 2013). According to agency theory, agency conflicts occur between principals and agents because of widely dispersed ownership and the separation of shareholders and management (Jensen and Meckling, 1976).