AUDIT QUALITY AND FIRM VALUE OF LISTED OIL AND GAS COMPANIES IN NIGERIA

Abstract

Quality audit ensures reliability of financial statement and as such enhances firm valuation and investors’ confidence. The aims of this study is to find the empirical evidence of the effect of Audit Quality on firm value of oil and gas industries in Nigeria, the study covers 12 years from 2009 to 2020. Unbalanced data were collected from secondary source using annual reports and account of the listed oil and gas firm. The population of the study consist of all twelve (12) listed oil and gas companies quoted on Nigeria stock exchange market as at December 2020. A whole population was used as the sample of the study. The study observed that Audit quality has positive and significant effect on firm value.  This implies that audit quality significantly influences firm value and this could be attributed to several factors such as such as investors’ confidence and auditor’s specialization on audits to constrain earnings management. The study recommends that Regulatory oversight and effective operational guidelines for auditors to be standardized to maintain investor’s confidence and ensuring efficient capital market in constraining information asymmetry.