Research On The Audit Risk Of Livestreaming Companies

With the continuous development of mobile Internet technology,the livestreaming industry has been booming up.In 2016,known as the first year of China Mobile’s livestreaming,the volume of the livestreaming market surged.Since then,fierce market competition and increasingly stringent policy supervision have made the livestreaming industry increasingly mature and stable.Currently,livestreaming users have accounted for more than half of the Internet users.However,the rapid development of the online livestreaming industry is also accompanied by many risks.For the auditors,although huge changes have taken place in the external audit environment,audit objects and audit content of the livestreaming company,there are still few specific audit guidance and audit methods that match the livestreaming industry.These new audit risks have brought many challenges to the audit work.In view of the above situation,it is necessary to take action in researching and supplement the current status of audit risk based on the audit characteristics of livestreaming companies.However,there are few studies on audit risks in livestreaming industry in the past literature.Therefore,the research question of this article is: What are the particularities of the audit in livestreaming companies and what are the risk points that auditors should pay attention to in the audit process,and how to deal with these audit risks?This article uses a combination of theoretical basis and case studies in analyzing.First,understanding the current status and deficiencies of domestic and foreign scholars’ research on the audit of livestreaming companies;second,combining the principal-agent theory and the modern audit risk model to analyze the particularity of the livestreaming industry and audit Risk factors;then,analyzing the risk of the case company called Inke at the level of major misreporting and inspection risk;finally,putting forward preventive measures and recommendations for the audit risk of online livestreaming companies。This article finds that the audit risks in the live broadcast industry are mainly reflected in the following points:(1)The material misstatement risks at the level of financial statements is mainly caused by factors such as industry policy supervision,intellectual property disputes,fierce industry competition,and a relatively single profit model.(2)The material misstatement risks at the level of assertion is mainly caused by factors such as revenue recognition of virtual goods,confirmation and subsequent measurement of intangible assets,imperfect internal governance institutions,and new changes in the information environment.(3)The detection risks are mainly caused by the lack of comprehensive capabilities of the auditors and the lack of advanced audit software.At the same time,according to the above audit risks,the following suggestions are made:(1)Make a comprehensive analysis of the company’s operating situation and attention to nonfinancial information.(2)Understand and be familiar with the livestreaming business process,combined with IT audits,conduct corresponding control tests and substantive procedures,and conduct a comprehensive evaluation of the internal control system.(3)Improve the comprehensive ability and quality of certified public accountants,develop and optimize audit software,and use big data technology for auditing.The practical significance of this article is that by comparing the differences about audit between the livestreaming industry and traditional enterprise,get the key points of the audit in livestreaming industry;explore how the current status and characteristics of the livestreaming industry have led to increased audit risks,which is beneficial to livestreaming companies pay attention and avoid in the operation process;provide practical countermeasures for the audit of livestreaming industry,which is helpful for the certified public accountants to reduce the audit risk to a certain extent and improve the audit quality and efficiency when performing the audit of the livestreaming industry.