Japan will urge London to continue to allow Japanese GAAP
26 Jan 2004
Today's issue of the Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan's main business newspaper, has Reported that representatives of Japanese business organisations will go to London to try to convince the UK Financial Services Authority (FSA) not to go ahead with its proposal to require foreign companies listed on the London Stock Exchange to prepare financial statements using only US GAAP or IFRS.
Currently, non-UK listed companies may report using their national GAAP. The EU accounting regulation requiring EU listed companies to adopt IFRS in 2005 does not apply to non-EU companies listed on EU exchanges, but individual EU countries can extend the requirement to such companies. The FSA has issued a Consultation Paper (PDF 318k) in which FSA said:
"With the introduction of IAS..., there will be consistency amongst all EU listed issuers that produce consolidated accounts. We believe that it is in the interests of investors for there to be consistency between all equity issuers with primary listings. So, we propose that overseas non-EU issuers should be required to report in either IAS or US GAAP." |