The new appointments fill vacancies that will arise when two current members of the IFRS Interpretations Committee reach the end of their second terms in June 2012. Sandra Peters is Head of Financial Reporting Policy with the CFA Institute in the United States and John O'Grady is the Asia-Pacific IFRS Leader for Ernst & Young.

The two reappointed members will complete their first terms at the end of June 2012 and have been reappointed for a further three-year term. Laurence Rivat is a Partner and Leader of Deloitte's IFRS Centre of Excellence in Paris and member of the Deloitte IFRS Leadership Team. Kazuo Yuasa is General Manager with the IFRS Office, Corporate Finance Unit, Fujitsu Limited, Japan.

Please click for the IFRS Foundation press release on the appointments (link to IASB website) and our overview of all members of the IFRS Interpretations Committee.

The outreach event was part of a series of events held in various European cities in order to hear what practitioners and others thought about the topics considered in the discussion papers on business combinations under common control (published in October 2011) and improving the financial reporting of income tax (published in December 2011).

Since EFRAG had deliberately not taken a position in either discussion paper but rather attempted to provide a comprehensive analysis of the issues in order to stimulate a debate in Europe, the discussion was very open and comprehensive and even covered issues originally not included in the discussion papers such as general transactions made between related parties and the definition of income tax.

Please click for access to the report on the EFRAG website. Reports from the other outreach events of the series have not been published yet.

The input received during the outreach events and the comment letters on the discussion papers will form the basis for EFRAG’s re-deliberation of the issues. EFRAG will then decide about what further steps need to be taken before putting forward views to the IASB.

The FSB was established through the G7 and G20 to coordinate at the international level the work of national financial authorities and international standard setting bodies (including the IASB) and to develop and promote the implementation of effective regulatory, supervisory and other financial sector policies.

The creation of the EDTF follows on from an FSB hosted roundtable on risk disclosures by financial institutions held in December 2011.  The FSB issued a summary of the outcomes from the roundtable in a March 2012 press release (link to FSB website), which also noted the intention to form a task force.

In addition to developing principles for enhanced disclosure, the task force is also to identify leading practice risk disclosures presented in annual reports for end-year 2011 based on broad risk areas.

Click for FSB press release (link to FSB website).  A summary of the key messages from the December 2011 roundtable is presented below for the convenience of our readers.

Mr Maijoor began his speech describing his understanding of ESMA's role and the key objectives he sees for ESMA in the context of the broader regulatory reform of financial markets across the main regions of the world. He touched upon the proposals for reforming audit in the EU, the combination of audit and consulting, and the strengthening supervision. He also pointed out ESMA's own standard setting activities and its interaction with the IASB.

Moving then on to the topic of financial reporting, Mr Maijoor spoke about two issues in-depth: International Public Accounting Standards (IPSAS) and IFRS as global accounting standards.

He countered the possible surprise at a financial market regulator addressing the issue of public sector accounting by pointing out the fact that due to the current crisis governments have become important and active capital markets participants and the difference between corporate debt and sovereign debt has become more and more obsolete. Mr Maijoor strongly supported a current consultation of stakeholders on the suitability of introducing IPSAS for EU Member States: "There is currently a wide gap in the transparency obligations for sovereign debt issuers compared with corporate debt issuers. [...] We all know that a high level of transparency is needed for effective market discipline and good governance, and good governance is now especially needed in the Euro-zone."

On the topic of global accounting standards, he expressed respect regarding the on-going debates in the US on the implications of IFRS adoption and listed the goals that have already been achieved. However, he also pointed out that the G20 are getting impatient and are increasing the pressure on the IASB and FASB to achieve a single set of high quality, global accounting standards while the US still seemed to hesitate to come to a conclusion. "However, the absence of a clear US SEC position, and even more regrettably, the lack of clarity on the timetable for their decision have not been to the advantage of the IASB." Mr Maijoor concluded his speech on a hopeful note: "I know that my American counterparts at the SEC believe in international co-operation, and I hope they will send a positive message to the market soon by having the courage to adopt IFRS."

Please click for the full text of Mr Maijoor's speech on the ESMA website.

The Trustees of the IFRS Foundation, the body responsible for the governance and oversight of the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB), discussed the following topics:

• Trustees’ Strategy Review and the efforts to co-ordinate the report of the Trustees’ Strategy Review with that of the Monitoring Board
• Regional outreach activities and meetings with key UK and European stakeholders to discuss IFRSs, their application and other matters of significance
• Report of the Nominating Committee concerning the appointments of the Trustees Ronald Arculli, C. B. Bhave and James Quigley and the appointment of Chungwoo Suh as a member of the IASB
• Update on the opening of the Asia-Oceania office in Tokyo, which is scheduled for October 2012
• Trustee meetings for 2013
• Report of the Chairman of the IASB concerning the major convergence projects and the agenda consultation
• Report of the Due Process Oversight Committee regarding the development of the Due Process Handbook, the review of the effectiveness of the IFRS Interpretations Committee and the post implementation reviews
• Report of the Education & Content Services Committee

Please click for the full summary on the IASB's website. The next meeting of the Trustees of the IFRS Foundation is scheduled for 12 July 2012.

The updated Handbook includes due process enhancements recommended by the recent Monitoring Board Governance Review and Trustees' Strategy Review. It also includes recommendations from the Trustees' Review of the Efficiency and Effectiveness of the IFRS Interpretations Committee (IFRIC).

The proposals are aimed to:

• consolidate due process requirements of the IASB and IFRIC to a single document
• provide an in-depth discussion of the process of evaluating the effects of an IFRS
• describe a more detailed process when developing post-implementation reviews
• allow the Monitoring Board to refer issues of consideration by the IASB
• include consideration to the due process requirements during outreach activities conducted by the IASB
• integrate other enhancements resulting from conversations with the Trustees' Due Process Oversight Committee.

The updated Handbook is a significant rewrite of existing requirements, introducing many new policy level objectives and formalising current practice.

Comments on Invitation to Comment IASB and IFRS Interpretations Committee Due Process Handbook are due by 5 September 2012.

Click for (links to IASB website):

• IASB press release
• Updated IFRS Foundation Due Process handbook

The Monitoring Group (MG) and the PIOB released their consultation papers in March 2012.  The closing date for submissions is 28 June 2012.

Some of the key points noted in the IFAC submission include:

• IFAC strongly supports the notion of private sector/public sector shared arrangements for international standard setting and believes there are risks associated with any change to a set of arrangements that has no private sector input
• IFAC does not consider that the development of auditing and assurance, ethical, and education standards is done “for the accountancy profession” (as asserted in the MG consultation document), rather IFAC believes that standards are developed with a broad group of stakeholders and interested parties in mind, in a manner consistent with current arrangements which were agreed between IFAC and the international regulatory community
• IFAC considers it critical to ensure that the legitimacy and acceptance of IPSASs is further enhanced through the existence of public oversight. As such, IFAC strongly supports, and encourages, public oversight of the IPSASB through bringing it under the purview of the PIOB.

More information is available on the IFAC website.

The tentative agenda is available on our meeting page for the meeting.

In a response to media reports about its activities (link to AAOIFI website) the AAOIFI has provided the following current status and expected dates:

More information on developments in Islamic accounting is available on our dedicated IAS Plus resource page.