IFRS in Perspective

In 2011, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will decide whether to require, allow, or continue to forbid the use of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) by public U.S. companies in their SEC filings. We'll also see new accounting standards for revenue, leases, and financial instruments introduced into IFRS and U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) – standards that will be the same in both IFRS and U.S. GAAP but unlike any currently found in either set of standards. Meanwhile, both public and private U.S. companies that participate in the global economy will increasingly find themselves having to use current IFRS in addition to—not instead of—current U.S. GAAP in order to meet statutory financial reporting requirements imposed by other countries.

This blog post concludes a series that explains the rationale for the United States and other countries to collaborate in creating a single, global registry of financial reporting standards. In this post, I'll explain why the "single-sandbox" approach is more likely to produce benefits for the United States and other countries than present attempts to obtain universal agreement on a single set of standards emanating from a single standard-setter.

This blog post is the third of a series that explains the rationale for the United States and other countries to collaborate in creating a single, global registry of financial reporting standards rather than a single set of standards emanating from a single standard-setter. In this post, I'll explain how the "single-sandbox" approach would maximize the quality of the financial reporting standards used in the United States and throughout the world. As such, I'll be addressing one of the most strident objections to present efforts to converge financial reporting standards on a global basis.

I'm interrupting my "Single Sandbox" series of posts to direct your attention to an opinion piece I wrote on the SEC's February 24, 2010 announcement regarding IFRS and convergence. You'll find it at http://www.accountingweb.com/topic/cfo/opinion-sec-ifrs-support-not-all-its-cracked-be.

Within the context of this blog, I'd say the SEC has developed the right plan to answer the wrong question.

Thanks for reading - stay tuned as my series resumes shortly.

This blog post is the second of a series that explains the rationale for the United States and other countries to collaborate in creating a single, global registry of financial reporting standards rather than a single set of standards emanating from a single standard-setter. In my last post, I explained how the "single-sandbox" approach would significantly enhance the comparability of financial statements prepared in accordance with registered financial reporting standards without imposing a one-size-fits-all solution on reporting entities. In this post, I'll explain four ways in which the single-sandbox approach would drive non-value-adding costs out of the financial reporting supply chain.