Audit firm rotation is a poor instrument to promote independence, especially in an environment
where auditors are appointed by board audit committees with intensive participation of
management. The potential benefits of rotation seem likely to be exceeded by the harm
associated with the “beauty contest” during the auditor hiring process. Rotation actually impairs
audit quality by enabling more frequent opinion shopping and lowballing. Rotation also
discourages accretion of audit expertise, downgrades the valuable signal of auditor change, and
shifts even more resources from substantive verification and tests to marketing of audit services.
Most of the benefits of rotation can be realized by rotating the engagement partners. Given the
limited independence of most audit committees from the management, improving audit quality
through firm rotation may simply not be possible. A more fruitful approach is for the
FASB/IASB to rethink their approach to writing standards of financial reporting, so as to
enhance the verifiability of financial reports and improve both accounting and audit qualit