L'evoluzione delle funzioni del comitato per il controllo interno e la revisione contabile secondo le previsioni della Direttiva 2014/56/UE del 16 aprile 2014

On 3 April 2014, the European Parliament adopted the revised Directive as well as the Regulation, published in the Official Journal of the EU on 27 May 2014 and now known as Directive 2014/56/UE and Regulation 537/2014. In its new formulation, article 39 6) c. of Directive 2014/56/UE amends the scope of the audit committee related to the financial reporting process. It is important to be aware of that the amendments made in the Di-rective 2014/56/UE and Regulation 537/2014 are focused on the conse-quences for audit committees of new legislation for external auditors. These changes do not have any specific effect on the risk management and internal audit functions. The Directive 2006/43 (Statutory Audit Directive) repealed explicitly the Directive 84/253/EEC but is still known as the 8th Company Law Directive. It was adopted in May 2006 after 2 years of deliberation. The 8th Company Law Directive requires certain types of organizations to be equipped with an audit committee or a body with similar functions. The description of the audit committee and its tasks is broad in scope and details are left to mem-ber states and the relevant national authorities in charge of implementing Directive 2006/43. The rationale behind the audit committee concept is to ensure there is a fil-ter between external auditors and operational managers, thus strengthening ethical issues and avoiding pressures and influences from both sides. This mandatory audit committee has a wider scope than just financial re-porting risks. It extends over the monitoring of the company’s risk manage-ment, internal controls and internal audit. The paper analyzes the main changes as regards, in particular, the audit committee as required by art. 41 of the Directive, and compared with the audit committee required by the Corporate Governance Code for Italian listed companies (“Codice di Autodisciplina” – Luglio 2014).