Revised Auditing Standards on Fair Value, Audit Sampling, Related Parties and Opening Balances
The Council of the Institute in its recently concluded 283rd meeting has approved four more Standards on Auditing. These SAs relate to important aspects in the audit process such as fair value, audit sampling, analytical procedures and opening balances. These new Standards are more elaborate as they provide ample application guidance on various concepts discussed in the Standards.
- The Revised Standard on Auditing (SA) 540, “Auditing Accounting Estimates, Including Fair Value Accounting Estimates, and Related Disclosures” provides timely guidance on audit of fair value and accounting estimates in the current times of market uncertainty and liquidity crunch. Accounting estimate is an approximation of a monetary amount in the absence of precise means of measurement. Risk of material misstatement increases significantly since accounting estimate involves the use of judgment by the management. This Standard provides specific guidance to auditor while verifying the valuation of complex financial instruments which are not traded in active and open market and transactions involving the exchange parties without monetary consideration. This Standard is applicable for audits of financial statements for periods beginning on or after April 1, 2009.
- Revised SA 530 “Audit Sampling” is also applicable from April 1, 2009 and it guides auditors while using sampling techniques in their audit assignments, and covers both statistical and non-statistical sampling.
- SA 510, “Initial Engagements – Opening Balances” and SA 550 “Related Parties” are applicable from April 1, 2010. SA 510 deals with auditor’s responsibility with respect to opening balances when performing initial audit engagements. SA 550 is aimed to strengthen current auditing practice in this area by emphasizing the need for the auditor to understand related party relationships and transactions in order to identify the risks of material misstatement to which these may give rise, and directing the auditor to focus work effort on the assessed risks of material misstatement, including those due to fraud
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