IIB 

113TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION H. R. 1564 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

JULY 9, 2013 

Received; read twice and referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and 

Urban Affairs 

AN ACT 

To amend the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 to prohibit the 

Public Company Accounting Oversight Board from requiring public companies to use specific auditors or require the use of different auditors on a rotating basis. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 


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1 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

2 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Audit Integrity and 

3 Job Protection Act’’. 

4 SEC. 2. LIMITATION ON AUTHORITY RELATING TO AUDI5 TORS. 

6 Section 103 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (15 

7 U.S.C. 7213) is amended by adding at the end the fol8 lowing: 

9 ‘‘(e) LIMITATION ON AUTHORITY.—The Board shall 

10 have no authority under this title to require that audits 

11 conducted for a particular issuer in accordance with the 

12 standards set forth under this section be conducted by spe13 cific registered public accounting firms, or that such au14 dits be conducted for an issuer by different registered pub15 lic accounting firms on a rotating basis.’’. 

16 SEC. 3. STUDY OF MANDATORY ROTATION OF REGISTERED 

17 PUBLIC ACCOUNTING FIRMS. 

18 (a) STUDY AND REVIEW REQUIRED.—The Comp19 troller General of the United States shall update its No20 vember 2003 report entitled ‘‘Study on the Potential Ef21 fects of Mandatory Audit Firm Rotation’’, and review the 

22 potential effects, including the costs and benefits, of re23 quiring the mandatory rotation of registered public ac24 counting firms. In addition, the update shall include a 

25 study of— 


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1 (1) whether mandatory rotation of registered 

2 public accounting firms would mitigate against po3 tential conflicts of interest between registered public 

4 accounting firms and issuers; 

5 (2) whether mandatory rotation of registered 

6 public accounting firms would impair audit quality 

7 due to the loss of industry or company-specific 

8 knowledge gained by a registered public accounting 

9 firm through years of experience auditing the issuer; 

10 and 

11 (3) what affect the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 

12 has had on registered public accounting firms’ inde13 pendence and whether additional independence re14 forms are needed. 

15 (b) REPORT REQUIRED.—Not later than 1 year after 

16 the date of enactment of this Act, the Comptroller General 

17 shall submit a report to the Committee on Banking, Hous18 ing, and Urban Affairs of the Senate and the Committee 

19 on Financial Services of the House of Representatives on 

20 the results of the study and review required by this sec21 tion. 

22 (c) DEFINITION.—For purposes of this section, the 

23 term ‘‘mandatory rotation’’ refers to the imposition of a 

24 limit on the period of years in which a particular regVerDate Mar 15 2010 23:38 Jul 09, 2013 Jkt 029200 PO 00000 Frm 00003 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\H1564.RFS H1564

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1 istered public accounting firm may be the auditor of 

2 record for a particular issuer. 

Passed the House of Representatives July 8, 2013. 

Attest: KAREN L. HAAS, 

Clerk. 


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