PCAOB Issues Interim Analysis Report on Critical Audit Matters

The PCAOB has published a second report on the initial impact of its critical audit matter (CAM) requirements (the first report was released in October 2020). Key findings of the follow-up report include:

• “The average number of CAMs per audit report has declined over time, and the proportion of audit reports that communicate a single CAM has increased.”
• “Investor awareness and use of CAMs continues to develop.”
• “The staff has not found evidence of significant unintended consequences from auditors’ implementation of the CAM requirements.”

To accompany the report, the PCAOB also released the following two staff white papers that provide “technical detail and additional information related to the methodologies by which the PCAOB gained information to support the findings in the interim analysis reports”:

• Second Stakeholder Outreach on the Initial Implementation of CAM Requirements.
• Second Econometric Analysis on the Initial Implementation of CAM Requirements.

For more information, see the postimplementation review page on the PCAOB’s Web site.