Investigating the Relationship between Corporate Governance Mechanism and the Reduction of Audit Report Delay for the Companies Listed on Tehran Stock Exchange

Investors rely on the newer data in financial decisions. Now than ever before, timeliness of accounting information has become an important issue as a result of phenomenal changes in both modern technology and business practices worldwide, including practices of corporate governance. This paper, investigated the relationship between corporate governance (By four measures consist of board size, board independence, CEO duality and ownership concentration) and the reduction of audit report delay for the companies listed in Tehran Stock Exchange. The sample consists of 64 companies in the period 2005-2012 and for testing the hypothesis the statistical panel data regression was exerted. The results show that there is a negative and significant statistical relationship between CEO duality and ownership concentration with audit report delay. This means that, the separation of roles between the CEO and chairman will improve the quality of financial reporting and reduce the audit report delay and companies with higher ownership, will present their audit report with lower delay. Also, the results show that there is not a statistical relationship between board size and board independence with audit report delay. This means that, board size and independence do not lead to the reduction of audit report delay.