PCAOB Approves New Risk Assessment Standards

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) approved a set of eight new auditing standards today all relating to risk assessment. First proposed in 2008, the eight standards, approved as a suite, cover risk assessment throughout every stage of an audit from the initial planning stages through the evaluation of the audit results. Acting PCAOB chair Daniel L. Goelzer said that the new standards will promote the use of more sophisticated risk assessments and minimize risk of failure to detect material misstatements. The eight standards are:

• Auditing Standard 8 (AS No. 8) - Audit Risk. This standard discusses the auditor's consideration of audit risk in an audit of financial statements as part of an integrated audit or an audit of financial statements only. It describes the components of audit risk and the auditor's responsibilities for reducing audit risk to an appropriately low level in order to obtain reasonable assurance that the financial statements are free of material misstatement.
• Auditing Standard 9 (AS No. 9) - Audit Planning. This standard establishes requirements regarding planning an audit, including assessing matters that are important to the audit, and establishing an appropriate audit strategy and audit plan.
• Auditing Standard 10 (AS No. 10) - Supervision of the Audit Engagement. This standard sets forth requirements for supervision of the audit engagement, including, in particular, supervising the work of engagement team members. It applies to the engagement partner and to other engagement team members who assist the engagement partner with supervision.
• Auditing Standard 11 (AS No. 11) - Consideration of Materiality in Planning and Performing an Audit. This standard describes the auditor's responsibilities for consideration of materiality in planning and performing an audit.
• Auditing Standard 12 (AS No. 12) - Identifying and Assessing Risks of Material Misstatement. This standard establishes requirements regarding the process of identifying and assessing risks of material misstatement of the financial statements. The risk assessment process discussed in the standard includes information-gathering procedures to identify risks and an analysis of the identified risks.
• Auditing Standard 13 (AS No. 13) - The Auditor's Responses to the Risks of Material Misstatement. This standard establishes requirements for responding to the risks of material misstatement in financial statements through the general conduct of the audit and performing audit procedures regarding significant accounts and disclosures.
• Auditing Standard 14 (AS No. 14) - Evaluating Audit Results. This standard establishes requirements regarding the auditor's evaluation of audit results and determination of whether the auditor has obtained sufficient appropriate audit evidence. The evaluation process set forth in this standard includes, among other things, evaluation of misstatements identified during the audit; the overall presentation of the financial statements, including disclosures; and the potential for management bias in the financial statements.
• Auditing Standard 15 (AS No. 15) - Audit Evidence. This standard explains what constitutes audit evidence and establishes requirements for designing and performing audit procedures to obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence to support the opinion expressed in the auditor's report.

If approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission, these standards will be effective fur audits of fiscal periods beginning on or after Dec. 15, 2010.