The standards and amendments affected include: 

• IPSAS 41 Financial Instruments;
• IPSAS 42 Social Benefits;
• Long-term Interests in Associates and Joint Ventures (Amendments to IPSAS 36) and Prepayment Features with Negative Compensation (Amendments to IPSAS 41);
• Collective and Individual Services (Amendments to IPSAS 19); and
• Improvement to IPSAS, 2019. 

The amendment can be accessed on the IPSASB website.

The two main topics for the meeting were:

• Practical implementation, including measurement, of core indicators for entity reporting on the contribution towards the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals: Review of case studies
• Climate-related financial disclosures in mainstream entity reporting: good practices and key challenges

The keynote address on the second topic was given by Erkki Liikanen, Chair of the IFRS Foundation Trustees.

All presentations from the meeting (including the presentations from the workshop on "Assurance on sustainability reports: current practices and challenges“ on 30 October 2020) can now be accessed online and there are also recordings of all sessions.

Major groups of valuation topics identified in the consultation paper as potential IVSC projects include gaps in the current IVS suite of standards, automated valuation models, environmental, social and governance aspects, long-term value, social value, uncertainty and risk as well as data management.

Please click to access the consultation paper on the IVSC website. Comments are requested by 15 January 2021.

On the first day of the meeting, the IASB will discuss the following:

• Work plan
• Maintenance and consistent application
• Disclosure initiative — Subsidiaries that are SMEs
• Management commentary
• Post implementation review of IFRS 10-12

On the second day of the meeting, the IASB and FASB will discuss the following:

• Goodwill and impairment
• Leases other than COVID-19
• COVID-19
• Supply chain financing

The full agenda for the meeting can be found here. We will post any updates to the agenda, our comprehensive pre-meeting summaries, as well as observer notes from the meeting on this page as they become available.

IASB meeting

Board work plan update: Last month the Board decided to begin the post-implementation review (PIR) of the IFRS 9 classification and measurement requirements and reconsider at a later date when to begin the PIRs of the IFRS 9 impairment and hedge accounting requirements and of IFRS 15. The Board will consider the start dates of those PIRs in the second half of 2021.

Post-implementation review of IFRS 10, IFRS 11 and IFRS 12: The Board confirmed the publication of the request for information (RFI), with a 150-day comment period (rather than the 180 days recommended by the staff). The RFI is expected to be published in December.

Maintenance and Consistent Application—Deferred Tax related to Assets and Liabilities arising from a Single Transaction: The Board is finalising amendments to IAS 12. The amendments are expected to be published in the second quarter of 2021 and will have an effective date of 1 January 2023.

Management Commentary: The staff raised some issues identified during drafting of the Exposure Draft (“sweep issues”). The Board decided that entities not applying IFRS Standards should be permitted to apply the Practice Statement. They also decided to use the term ‘accuracy’ rather than ‘freedom of error, emphasising that it applies to quantitative and qualitative information.

Disclosure Initiative, Subsidiaries that are SMEs: The IASB is developing a Standard setting out reduced disclosure requirements for subsidiaries apply IFRS Standards but meet the definition of an SME. The Board decided to have exceptions to the process for adapting disclosure requirements when preparing the analysis of adaptions to the disclosure requirements of the IFRS for SMEs Standard.  

For an analysis of how the IASB work plan has changed after this meeting, please see https://www.iasplus.com/en/news/2020/11/iasb-work-plan.

Joint IASB—FASB education meeting

The boards updated each other on individual projects that partially or entirely overlap with a project of the other board. The purpose of the meeting was to share information. As such, no decisions were made.

COVID-19: The boards explained the steps they have taken to respond to the COVID-19, such as implementation and educational guidance and adjustments to their work plans. Much of the discussion focused on the accounting for government grants.

Leases other than COVID-19: The IASB staff explained the recent application questions discussed by the IFRS Interpretations Committee and narrow-scope standard-setting that has been initiated with regard to sale and leaseback transactions. The FASB is monitoring the implementation of its equivalent Standard and in July 2020 added a project to its technical agenda to address issues on which the FASB can act because it already has sufficient information from stakeholders. Both boards highlighted that they should continue to strive for as much convergence as possible between the respective Standards.

Goodwill and Impairment: Both the FASB and the IASB have on their respective agendas projects covering accounting for goodwill. Those projects do not constitute a joint project. However, both boards previously decided to monitor each other’s work because of the largely converged accounting models for business combinations. The FASB’s project is in an active project phase while the IASB’s project is in a research phase.

The initial discussion focused on the IASB’s preliminary view that an entity should be required to disclose the metrics that management (the chief operating decision maker or ‘CODM’ as described in IFRS 8) will use to monitor whether the objectives of the acquisition are met. The boards also discussed the subsequent accounting for goodwill.

Supply chain financing: The IASB described the issues that have been submitted to the IFRS Interpretations Committee, and the tentative agenda decision it has published. The IASB also outlined a possible narrow-scope standard-setting project in early 2021. The Big 4 firms submitted an agenda request to the FASB in October 2019 for guidance on disclosure and cash flow statement presentation of supplier finance programmes involving trade payables. Having undertaken research and outreach, the FASB decided in October 2020 to add a project to its agenda to develop disclosure requirements related to supplier finance programmes involving trade payables (a narrow scope). The FASB noted that there is increased disclosure in the US as a consequence of SEC staff speeches and guidance that encourages qualitative and quantitative disclosures in MD&A.

Please click to access the detailed notes taken by Deloitte observers for the entire meeting.

Board work plan update: This was the first periodical update of the work plan, replacing the research update. The staff have been reviewing the timing of consultation documents and recommend some changes to the timing of consultations (such as delaying the Management commentary ED until May 2021) and extending some comment periods (such as for the DP on BCUCC), all of which the Board supported. The work plan on the IFRS Foundation website was updated after the meeting.

2020 Agenda consultation: The IASB is preparing to issue a Request for Information (RFI) in the first quarter of 2021, as part of the public consultation on its work plan that it is required to undertake every five years. The Board decided that the RFI describe 27 potential projects identified from outreach undertaken.

Maintenance and consistent application — Deferred tax related to assets and liabilities arising from a single transaction: In July 2019, the Board published an ED proposing amendments to IAS 12. The Board confirmed the proposal to narrow the scope of the recognition exemption so that it will not apply to transactions that give rise to equal amounts of taxable and deductible temporary differences. The Board also decided to remove the capping proposal.  

Management commentary: This was the last decision-making meeting for the ED. The Board gave the staff permission to begin the formal drafting and balloting processes. The staff papers included the working draft of their guidance on the provision of information about matters that could affect an entity’s long-term prospects, intangible resources and relationships, and ESG matters, but this was to elicit feedback rather than seeking any formal decisions. The ED is expected to be published in May 2021.

Extractive activities: The staff presented findings on the diversity of accounting policies applied to exploration and evaluation expenditure within the scope of IFRS 6. The staff’s research indicates that diversity is primarily due to the extent to which an entity recognises exploration and evaluation expenditure incurred during the reporting period as an asset and the unit of account that an entity decides to apply to its exploration and evaluation expenditure asset. Most of the entities in the sample use area of interest accounting.  The ‘full cost’ and successful efforts methods are the most common accounting policies for oil and gas companies not applying ‘area of interest’ accounting. The Board was not being asked to make any decisions. Board members mentioned that a potential solution could be to amend IFRS 6 by requiring further disclosures but that the staff have to increase engagement with financial statement users for a better understanding of the disclosures that they would consider relevant.

Equity method: Work on reviewing aspects of IAS 28 began in May. The Board decided that the objective of this review be to assess whether application problems with the equity method for associates and joint ventures can be addressed by identifying and explaining the principles of IAS 28. The Board decided not to consider whether the equity method is a one-line consolidation method or a measurement method, whether it should be replaced by one of the measurement bases in the Conceptual Framework or whether significant influence should be the basis for when to apply the equity method.

Disclosure initiative — Subsidiaries that are SMEs: The IASB is developing a Standard setting out reduced disclosure requirements for subsidiaries apply IFRS Standards but meet the definition of an SME. At this meeting the IASB decided on how entities will communicate that they have applied the reduced disclosure requirements and how the disclosure requirements of IAS 8 should be applied by these entities.

The staff gave an oral update on Dynamic Risk Management (DRM). The staff is setting up meetings to discuss the DRM model with 25 banks from different jurisdictions between now and the end of January 2021. The staff expect to present the feedback from this outreach to the Board in March or April 2021. The Board will then decide the project direction.

The staff gave an oral update on the IFRS Taxonomy, and the proposed updates (PTU/2019/1 Interest Rate Benchmark Reform—Amendments to IFRS 9, IAS 39 and IFRS 7 and PTU/2020/2 Amendments to IFRS 17, Extension of the Temporary Exemption from Applying IFRS 9 and Property, Plant and Equipment—Proceeds before Intended Use). Concerns continue to be raised about the paucity of comment letters (only one was received for PTU/2019/1 and none for PTU/2020/2).

Please click to access the detailed notes taken by Deloitte observers for the entire meeting.

Agenda decision to finalise

Supply Chain Financing Arrangements — Reverse Factoring: In June 2020, the Committee published a tentative agenda decision which analyses the presentation of liabilities arising from reverse financing arrangement in the statement of financial position, statement of cash flows and the related disclosure. The staff recommend that the Committee finalise the tentative agenda decision with some editorial changes.

New issues

IAS 1 Presentation of Financial Statements — Classification of debt with covenants as current or non-current: How does an entity determine whether it has "the right to defer settlement" when a long-term liability is subject to a condition and its compliance with the condition is tested at dates after the reporting date, applying the amended IAS 1?

IAS 19 Employee Benefits — Attributing benefit to periods of service: To which periods of service should an entity attribute benefit for a defined benefit plan, in a scenario where the amount of the retirement benefit an employee is entitled to depends on the length of services before retirement?

IAS 38 Intangible Assets — Configuration or customisation of costs in a cloud computing arrangement: How should a customer account for the upfront costs of configuring and customising the suppliers' application software to which it receives access in future?

IFRS 9 Financial Instruments — Hedging variability in cash flows due to real interest rates: Could a hedge of the variability in cash flows arising from the changes in real interest rate based on inflation index be accounted for as a cash flows hedge?

For all of the new issues, the staff have concluded that the principles and requirements in the relevant Standards provide an adequate basis to determine the appropriate accounting for the issue and that the Committee should publish a tentative agenda decision saying that no further action is required.

Work in progress: The staff are analysing requests related to the accounting of warrants that are initially classified as liabilities, costs necessary to sell inventories and preparation of financial statements when an entity is no longer a going concern.

The full agenda for the meeting and our comprehensive pre-meeting summaries can be found here.

IASB meeting

Board work plan update: Last month the Board decided to begin the post-implementation review (PIR) of the IFRS 9 classification and measurement requirements and reconsider at a later date when to begin the PIRs of the IFRS 9 impairment and hedge accounting requirements and of IFRS 15. The staff recommend considering the start dates of those PIRs in the second half of 2021.

Post-implementation review of IFRS 10, IFRS 11 and IFRS 12: The staff will ask to Board to confirm the publication of the request for information (RFI), with a 180-day comment period. The RFI is expected to be published in December.

Maintenance and Consistent Application—Deferred Tax related to Assets and Liabilities arising from a Single Transaction: The Board is finalising amendments to IAS 12. The staff recommend an effective date of 1 January 2023 for the amendments—this will be 18 months after the expected issue date of the amendments in the second quarter of 2021.

Management Commentary: The staff have raised some issues identified during drafting of the Exposure Draft (“sweep issues”). The staff recommend that entities not applying IFRS should be permitted to apply the Practice Statement. The staff also recommend using the term ‘accuracy’ rather than ‘freedom of error’.

Disclosure Initiative, Subsidiaries that are SMEs: The IASB is developing a Standard setting out reduced disclosure requirements for subsidiaries that apply IFRS Standards but meet the definition of an SME. At this meeting, the staff will propose exceptions to the process for adapting disclosure requirements for matters identified by staff when preparing the analysis of adaptions to the disclosure requirements of the IFRS for SMEs Standard or during the Board member’s review of that analysis.

Joint IASB—FASB education meeting

The purpose of this meeting is for the boards to update each other on individual projects that partially or entirely overlap with a project of the other board.

COVID-19: The boards will explain the steps they have taken to respond to the COVID-19, such as implementation and educational guidance and adjustments to their work plans.

Leases other than COVID-19: The IASB staff will explain the recent application questions discussed by the IFRS Interpretations Committee and narrow-scope standard-setting that has been initiated with regard to sale and leaseback transactions. The FASB is monitoring the implementation of its equivalent Standard and in July 2020 added a project to its technical agenda to address issues on which the FASB can act because it already has sufficient information from stakeholders.

Goodwill and Impairment: Both the FASB and the IASB have on their respective agendas projects covering accounting for goodwill. Those projects do not constitute a joint project. However, both boards previously decided to monitor each other’s work because of the largely converged accounting models for business combinations. The FASB’s project is in an active project phase while the IASB’s project is in a research phase.

Supply chain financing: The IASB will describe the issues that have been submitted to the IFRS Interpretations Committee, and the tentative agenda decision it has published. The IASB will also discuss a possible narrow-scope standard-setting project in early 2021. The Big 4 firms submitted an agenda request to the FASB in October 2019 for guidance on disclosure and cash flow statement presentation of supplier finance programmes involving trade payables. Having undertaken research and outreach, the FASB decided in October 2020 to add a project to its agenda to develop disclosure requirements related to supplier finance programmes involving trade payables (a narrow scope).

More information

Our pre-meeting summaries are available on our November meeting notes page and will be supplemented with our popular meeting notes after the meeting.

The consultation is intended to assess demand for global sustainability standards and what role the Foundation might play in the development of such standards.

Please click for access to the recordings on the IASB website. The introductory part in both sessions is the same, the questions put forward by the audience differ.

As reported earlier, among the topics discussed at the meeting were intangibles and the going concern assumption.

The full list of topics discussed at the meeting was:

• Issues surrounding separate financial statements
  • Presentations by Brazil, Italy, and Korea
• Primary financial statements
  • Presentations by EFRAG and Korea on the IASB exposure draft
• Cryptoassets
  • EFRAG discussion paper on the accounting for cryptoassets
• Intangibles
  • Joint paper by Canada, Germany, Japan, UK and US
• Going Concern
  • Presentations by Australia and New Zealand
• International financial reporting for non-profit organisations
• IPSASB update
• Fintech application and accounting standards
  • Presentation by Taiwan
• Impact of COVID-19 in Sri Lanka
  • Presentation by Sri Lanka

The next meeting is to be held on 8-9 March 2021; it will also be held by remote participation.

Please click for the full report from the meeting.