The first point made in relation to financial reporting regarded general purpose financial reporting, special purpose financial reporting, and the expectation gap that results from confusing or mixing these two forms of reporting. While general purpose financial reports come with the objective of providing financial information about the reporting entity that is useful to existing and potential investors, lenders, and other creditors in making decisions about providing resources to the entity, special purpose financial reports are prepared using a particular framework to address specific needs of specific users and these frameworks can include intentions to achieve a certain behaviour. Mr Bricker warned against applying expectations regarding special purpose financial reports to general purpose financial reports and against beginning standard-setting with additional objectives in mind that go beyond providing decision useful financial information.

Nevertheless, Mr. Bricker expressed the belief that general purpose financial reporting needs to continue to evolve and the standard-setters must continue to strive to set standards that provide the best information to a broad baseline of investors and investment advisers while preparers need to use judgement in applying the standards.

The second point Mr. Bricker made followed on from the need to continue to advance general purpose financial reporting to address expectations around financial reporting and any gaps that might exist. He stressed that everyone in the financial reporting structure needs to support the work of the accounting standard-setters and that thinking needs to be shared.

Review the full speech on the SEC's website.

In addition, the rule removes the requirement for operating companies and funds to post XBRL data on their Web sites.

Review the press release and final rule on the SEC’s website.

Here’s an excerpt:

Review the full article on the Wall Street Journal's website.

The proposal provides additional tools to assist with award determinations; establishes a uniform definition of “whistleblower”; increases the efficiency of processing whistleblower award applications; and clarifies and enhances certain policies, practices, and procedures related to implementing the program.

Comments on the proposed rule are due 60 days after the date of its publication in the Federal Register.

Review the press release on the SEC’s website.

Filings with serious deficiencies can be defined as those that are “not minimally compliant with statutory or regulatory requirements.” Letters issued on June 15, 2018, or later will be published first; these letters will appear on EDGAR within 10 calendar days of issuance.

The topics covered during the meeting were the following (numbers in brackets are ref­er­ences to the cor­re­spond­ing para­graphs of the summary):

• Rate-regulated activities (1–9): ASAF members discussed (1) unit of account and asset/liability definitions and (2) scope of the model. In addition, the ASAF members discussed the development of communication materials.
• Disclosure initiative — Principles of disclosure (10–24): ASAF members discussed (1) location of information that includes IFRS information outside of financial statements and non-IFRS information within financial statements and (2) accounting policy disclosures.
• Commodity loans and related transactions (25–43): ASAF members discussed several topics related to items described in the Board’s January 2018 meeting. These include: (1) the extent that entities in their jurisdictions enter into transactions, (2) diversity in accounting, (3) standard-setting activities, and (4) potential standard-setting activities.
• Accounting policies and accounting estimates (44–48): ASAF members were provided feedback on Exposure Draft, Accounting Policies and Accounting Estimates, and provided views on next steps for the project.
• Is financial reporting still an effective tool for equity investor in Australia? (49–51): ASAF members viewed a presentation from by the AASB on financial reporting’s effectiveness for equity investors in Australia.
• Goodwill and impairment (52–71): The ASAF members discussed (1) a staff proposal that amends the impairment testing of goodwill by considering movements in headroom and (2) the IFRS 3 requirement to recognize all identifiable intangible assets acquired in a business combination separately from goodwill.
• Primary financial statements (72–88): ASAF members provided views the Board’s tentative decisions to date on the application to financial entities and aggregation and disaggregation.
• IFRS Foundation Due Process Handbook review (89–99): ASAF member were updated on the Trustees’ review of the Due Process Handbook and provided views on its scope.
• Project updates and agenda planning (100–104): ASAF members were updated on the IASB research pipeline and provided advice on how to proceed with the post-implementation reviews of IFRS 10, IFRS 11, and IFRS 12.

A full summary of the meeting is available on the Board's website.

For Karim Hajjar, the link between sustainability and value is clear, though he might quibble with the strict use of the word sustainability. "If people ask me if I am a strong believer in sustainability I will say no", he says. "I am actually a big believer in sustainable value". And he made the difference clear in a statement he made in Solvay’s latest integrated report. "With over a 150 years of history we are deeply aware of the importance of value that stands the test of time", he wrote. "Sustainability without strong profits is unsustainable, while strong profits to the detriment of sustainability undermine the longevity of a business’" He is also increasingly clear on the strong links between ESG, environmental, social and corporate governance factors, and share price and returns.

In a video interview, he explains how integrated thinking should be the driver for integrated management, how investors are catching up, slowly, with an understanding of how all these ESG factors feed into the bottom line, and the value that non-financial, (what he calls extra-financial), measures create when strongly linked to the traditional financial measures. And he talks of how all these benefits provide much greater clarity in the quality and effectiveness of management.

Read the entire column on our Global IAS Plus site.

Below is an analysis of all changes made to the work plan since our last analysis on May 25, 2018.

Research projects

• Financial Instruments with Characteristics of Equity — The work plan still states that a discussion paper is expected in June 2018.

Main­te­nance projects

• Disclosure initiative — Definition of Material (Amendments to IAS 1 and IAS 8) — IFRS amendments are now expected in Q4 2018.
• Disclosure initiative — Targeted Standards-level review of disclosures — A decision on the project’s direction is now expected in July 2018.

The revised IASB work plan is available on the Board's website.