The newsletter summarises the matters discussed, decisions reached, and disagreements between the two boards, and notes:

After another long week of joint meetings during the month of April, the Insurance Accounting Standards Board (IASB) and the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) have prepared the ground for a last attempt to resolve the major disagreements between them. Officially moving the date of the exposure draft (ED) publication to June was the price to pay for the divergence in opinions between the Boards. The Boards did manage to make some progress and many important decisions have been reached. However, in our opinion, the complexity of the remaining issues still makes the June deadline look optimistic.

Click to download Issue 14 of the Insurance Accounting Newsletter (PDF 113k). There are permanent links all issues of the newsletter on IAS Plus Insurance Project Page.

 

A 'Q&A Report' has been published containing a summary of audience questions submitted during the live webcast and our suggested responses. Topics covered include the impact of IFRSs in developing countries, the US SEC's decision on adopting IFRSs, and the likelihood of re-exposure of the proposals in the IASB's major projects.

 

Click for:

• Q&A Report (PDF 22k)
• Dbriefs program information.

 

Click to go to the preliminary and unofficial Notes Taken by Deloitte Observers at the Meeting.

 

Click to go to the preliminary and unofficial Notes Taken by Deloitte Observers at the Meeting.

 

We disagree with the Board's decision to limit re-exposure of the revised IAS 37 to the revised measurement proposals only, and not provide constituents with an opportunity to comment on the entire draft Standard. The aspects of the proposals in the 2005 Exposure Draft to which we (and many other respondents) were strongly opposed were not limited to the measurement guidance. Furthermore, to express a view on the proposed measurement guidance in the 2010 Exposure Draft, it is fundamental that the scope, definitions and recognition criteria, to which this guidance is expected to apply, are understood. The Board made the entire draft Standard publicly available on 19 February 2010 but has given respondents no formal opportunity to comment on other aspects of the draft Standard, which may have a bearing on the measurement guidance if adopted as proposed. In so doing, we do not believe that the Board has adhered to the spirit of due process.

We make a similar comment in our letter on the Working Draft:

We urge the IASB to consider all unsolicited comments on the sections of the working draft other than the measurement proposals. We believe that the proposed change to the recognition criteria is so significant and so inextricably linked to the measurement guidance that it cannot be understood in isolation and without putting it within the context of the entire draft Standard.

 

• Tsuguoki (Aki) Fujinuma of Japan is Past Chairman and President, Japanese Institute of Certified Public Accountants, and Former President of IFAC (International Federation of Accountants).
• Robert R Glauber is currently a Lecturer at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and was a Visiting Professor at Harvard Law School. Previously, he served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of NASD (now FINRA), the private-sector regulator of the US securities markets, and as Under Secretary of the Treasury for Finance.

Click for:

• Monitoring Board Press Release (PDF 220k)
• List of All Trustees

 

Click to go to the preliminary and unofficial Notes Taken by Deloitte Observers at the Meeting.

 

On 29 April 2010, the IASB issued an exposure draft (ED) of proposed amendments to IAS 19 Employee Benefits. Among the amendments proposed to IAS 19 are:

• Immediate recognition of all estimated changes in the cost of providing defined benefits and all changes in the value of plan assets. This would eliminate the various methods currently in IAS 19, including the 'corridor' method, that allow deferral of some of those gains or losses.
• A new presentation approach that would clearly distinguish between different types of gains and losses arising from defined benefit plans. Specifically, the ED proposes that the following changes in benefit costs should be presented separately:
  • service cost – in profit or loss
  • finance cost (that is, net interest on the net defined benefit liability) – as part of finance costs in profit or loss
  • remeasurement – in other comprehensive income
  Comment deadline on the ED Defined Benefit Plans is 6 September 2010.

Click for IAS Plus Newsletter: Closing the Corridor — IASB Proposes Significant Changes to Pension Accounting

 

 

The meeting will be held at the IASB's offices in London on Monday to Thursday 17-20 May 2010 (no meeting on Friday 21 May). Portions of the meeting are joint meetings with FASB. The meeting will be open to public observation and will be webcast. Presented below is the revised agenda for the meeting.

IASB Board Meeting Revised Agenda17-20 May 2010, London

Monday 17 May 2010 IASB-FASB Joint Meeting (13:00-15:00pm London Time) Revenue Recognition Conceptual Framework – Qualitative Characteristics (Sweep Issues) Tuesday 18 May 2010 IASB-FASB Joint Meeting (08:00-18:30pm London Time) Leases Insurance Contracts Consolidation Wednesday 19 May 2010 IASB-FASB Joint Meeting (08:00-13:15pm London Time) Leases Insurance Contracts Derecognition IASB Meeting (14:00-17:30pm London Time) IFRS Interpretations Committee (IFRIC) Update Annual Improvements 2009-2010 Replacement of IAS 39: Hedge Accounting Thursday 20 May 2010 IASB Meeting (09:30-14:45pm London Time) Management Commentary Emissions Trading Consolidation Joint Ventures Replacement of IAS 39: Hedge Accounting

The workshop was sponsored by the Eastern, Central and Southern African Federation of Accountants (ECSAFA) and hosted in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, by the National Board of Accountants and Auditors of Tanzania. It was funded, in part, by The World Bank. Instructors were Paul Pacter, the IASB's Director of Standards for SMEs (and Board Member-designate), and Michael Wells, Director of the IASCF's IFRS Education Initiative. There were 100 participants from 10 countries: Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zimbabwe. All participants have committed to organise similar IFRS for SMEs training workshops in their own country. The IASB will provide the training materials and PowerPoint presentations (totalling 24 contact hours) for those workshops. Similar IASB/IASCF workshops are scheduled for Cairo (June 2010) and Panama (October 2010). For more information contact Michael Wells at mwells@iasb.org.