A Newsletter "Beyond the GAAP" é publicada mensalmente pela Mazars. O objectivo deste documento é manter o leitor informado sobre os desenvolvimentos na área da contabilidade.
Beyond the GAAP no.125 - September 2018
As the IASB is asked to re-examine some aspects of IFRS 17, we enter a period of uncertainty as regards both EFRAG’s work on the endorsement advice and the likely effective date of the standard. This also has implications for the deferral of IFRS 9, an alternative which many European bancassurers and insurance companies opted for. Meanwhile, the IFRS IC has published four agenda discussions; in this issue, we discuss the two relating to capitalisation of borrowing costs.
During October, the European legislators have endorsed interpretation IFRIC 23 – Uncertainty over Income Tax Treatments. Meanwhile, the IASB has published new short, but focused, documents.
Ahead of the preparation of financial statements at 31 December 2018, Beyond the GAAP summarises the standards applicable to the current year and revisits the information published by European entities on the introduction of IFRS 16 at 30 June 2018 - information which must be significantly expanded in December 2018.
Following on from last issue’s feature, which provided a general overview of standards applicable at 31 December 2018, Beyond the GAAP details, in special studies, two issues that may impact your financial statements either immediately with the first study on how to account for hyperinflation in Argentina, or more prospectively with the IASB’s latest proposals on the costs to be taken into account to determine whether a contract is onerous.
With annual report season in full swing, this issue of Beyond the GAAP is a slightly quicker read than last month’s issue. However, it does contain some particularly significant news, notably a number of interesting agenda decisions published by the IFRS Interpretations Committee.
News from the IASB continues to be dominated by work to amend IFRS 17, to which we return in this edition’s special study. This project even seems to overshadow progress on other issues, such as the presentation of financial statements, or the finalisation (with no changes to the standards) of work on segment reporting and interest rates. The fact remains that the latest news from the March IASB meeting suggests that there is no appetite, on the IASB’s part, for change on the thorniest aspect of IFRS 17, the level of contract aggregation.
Since 1 January 2018, IFRS 9 - Financial instruments and IFRS 15 - Revenue from Contracts with Customers have been effective, as the the IASB headline announced on its website on 8 January. In parallel, work to assess the impact of IFRS 9 on long-term investment is continuing at the European level, with the publication of the outcomes of a first factual analysis by EFRAG. This research has also acted as a spur to the IASB, which has followed up the EFRAG publication by issuing two presentations of its own on the contributions of IFRS standards to financial stability and long-term investment.
2017 ended fairly quietly, since the European Commission had already endorsed several texts in November and the IASB’s December meeting decided to postpone publication of most of its texts and draft texts, with the exception of the annual improvements to IFRSs, which we discuss in this month’s ‘A closer look’ study. This being the case, the implementation of IFRS 9 and IFRS 15 in January 2018 will be more than enough to keep entities and their auditors busy, on top of the preparation of the 2017 financial statements.