The Effect Of International Financial Reporting Standards On Current Tax Planning Strategy Essay

The United States is currently going through a big decision. It is deciding on whether to fully adopt International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), or to stay with the current U.S Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP). Since this is such a major decision, now would be an opportune time to take a look at what the pros and cons would be of switching to this new way of financial reporting, and in doing so, show why I believe the costs (both financial and otherwise) are too high to adopt a new set of reporting standards.

Despite those enormous advantages, it has been argued that IFRSS adoption lead to significant costs. The main argument is that IFRSs do not consider local needs and priorities as every country has their own ‘business environment, legal systems, cultures, language and political environment’ (Henderson and Peirson, 2000 cited from Malthus, S., 2004). However, to overcome this problem, IASB can accommodate flexible reporting standards that enable companies to choose alternatives that are more suitable for their external condition. It is opinion of some opponents of IFRS adoption that IAS is ‘insufficiently detailed’ (Uddin,M.S., 2005, p.4) that require accountants’ and auditor’ professional judgment. However, overly detail might be contra productive and not flexible in anticipating every changes and differences.

As the responsibilities of the global harmonization of accounting standards IFRS and GAAP transfer to IASB, FASB’s influence is waning. Advantages of the convergence include high quality financial reporting, which lowers cost of capital for investors and the cost of borrowing for companies. However, there are disadvantages to be noted, such as the costs of introducing IFRS to current and potential accountants and the risk of reducing the uniformity of financial reports due to the lax rulings of IFRS, which promotes earnings management amongst companies. Although arguments regarding the convergence remain prevalent, the completion of IFRS and GAAP is inevitable. Come year 2015, accountants, investors, and companies alike will discover whether or not the pros outweighed the cons; or vice versa.

This issue started to arise when IASB was developing IFRS 11 Joint Arrangements. The IASB have decided to remove the option to apply proportionate consolidation to jointly controlled entities that existed under IAS 31 Interests in Joint Ventures and this has widened the scope of equity method under IFRS (European Financial Reporting Advisory Group, 2014). Since then the IASB has been doing research project on equity method of accounting and considering various requests for guidance through narrow-scope amendments to IAS 28. Hence, Exposure Drafts has been published. They have addressed the diversity in practice. However, these proposed amendments are lacked of a clear conceptual basis and they were inconsistent with each other. They found out that components of consolidation techniques and measurement basis exist in IAS 28 and there is no

The U.S is moving toward IFRS (Forgeas, 2008). In the near future, all US company may need to report financial statements under IFRS. This makes the adaptation of IFRS unavoidable. Recently, some large multinational

“The uproar over fair value accounting practices, which some critics have blamed for the depths of the global financial crisis, threatens to sink a long-sought move by countries around the world toward a single set of international financial reporting standards (IFRS). The U.S. Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) has been working with London's International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) since 2002 toward what accounting professionals call convergence. The Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) is expected to announce its road map for conversion sometime this month, which will probably include early adoption in 2010 for about 110 of the largest U.S. companies with business operations throughout the world. The key difference between U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) and IFRS is that U.S. standards are based on explicit rules while the international standards' reliance on principles gives companies more room to use their judgment in deciding how to recognize revenue and other key metrics. Adoption of IFRS would also probably trigger a big tax hike for U.S. companies, which would no longer be able to use the last-in-first-out [LIFO] inventory accounting method, which doesn't exist under the international standards. The LIFO method assumes that goods purchased most recently are sold first and that the

Since 2002, Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) and International Accounting Standards Board’s (IASB) have been working toward “convergence” of US General Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) and International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). They have made significant progress in efforts to converge critical accounting standards such as those dealing with revenue recognition, financial instruments and leases. Once these projects are complete, the "era" of convergence will be at an end. Nevertheless, the benefits for investors of eventually getting to consistently applied, high-quality, globally accepted accounting

With the growth of international business there is a need to standardize financial statements globally. Presently there are “approximately 120 foreign private issuers currently that report to the Commission using IFRS financial statements.” By standardizing accounting practices investors will be able to make informed decisions based on comparability and accuracy of financial statements. The SEC released this statement in 2008, “We believe that IFRS has the potential to best provide the common platform on which companies can report and investors can compare financial information.” The SEC has created a “Roadmap” or plan to convert US GAAP over to IFRS. According to The Committee of

Over a decade ago, it was believed that the whole world would likely adopt the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP). At the point in time, the International Financial reporting Standards (IFRS) was only about ten years old. In the last decade, the IFRS has been adopted in many growing countries. Currently, it is anticipated that the U.S. will converge its GAAP with the international IFRS, leaving behind only a modified IFRS. This may occur as early as 2014.

For nearly half a century, a movement has been underway to establish a high-quality, comprehensive set of international accounting standards, with the goal of facilitating international trade and investment. In the global capital market, differences in the rules of accounting for the purposes of recognition, measurement, and reporting of financial results have impaired the smooth transfer of information across borders. Given that it accounts for nearly a third of the global market, there is considerable pressure for the United States to conform to the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), as promulgated by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB). While moving to a single set of accounting standards could create

Current U.S. GAAP comprises of broader revenue recognition concepts and numerous requirements for certain industries and transactions, which can result in different accounting for economically similar transactions. On the contrary, IFRS provides less guidance on revenue recognition such as for multiple-element arrangements. The lack of guidance is most noticeable among IFRS’s two main revenue recognition standards, IAS 18 Revenue and IAS 11 Construction Contracts. These

There have recently been a number of significant accounting changes due to FASB and the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) making modifications for the accounting treatment of business combinations in SFAS 141(R) and IFRS 3. Business combinations have implemented the newly created accounting treatment called the “acquisition method.” It will replace of the current “purchase method” strategy effective January 1, 2011. The major changes in the acquisition method involve variations to fair value measurement, goodwill recognition, and non-controlling interests.

Benefits of international standards convergence. Claimed benefits include lower financial statement preparation costs, lower network externalities, lower costs of capital, and increased foreign and domestic investment. By and large, current research tends to support these claims, as witnessed by the papers of Hail & Leuz (2006), Frost & Hayes (2006), Barth, Landsman, & Lang (2005), Covrig, DeFond & Hung (2007), and Barth, Landsman, Lang, & Williams (2006) discussed in the text. The basic message is that adoption of IASB standards leads to an improvement in reporting quality over domestic standards, although it is unclear whether or not IASB and FASB standards are of equal quality.

Over the course of the establishment of the IFRS, over 110 countries have adopted partially or fully implemented these standards. This brings the idea of a globalized standard closer to realization, when placed into the perspective that approximately 60% of the world uses one standard; while the U.S. operates on its own unique system. When all

With complete notion and awareness of how each country has their set of rules, “the goal of IFRS is to provide a global framework for how public companies prepare and disclose their financial statements” (Rouse, 2011). This view is meant to provide general guidelines, as well as international comparisons through conventional and edifying means. To bring broader and vivid objectives, IFRS replaced IAS, the older standards, in order to bring a more comprehensive and simplified accounting procedures.