Chairman Michel Prada discusses the path towards global accounting standards

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16 Oct 2013

At a stakeholder event sponsored by the DRSC (the German standard-setter) and the IFRS Foundation on the evening before the IFRS Foundation Trustees meeting in Frankfurt, Germany, Chairman Michel Prada gave a speech titled 'The bumpy path towards global accounting standards'. He noted that the IASB's work will always be controversial, but the gains of IFRS in Europe must be protected. He also emphasised the importance of collaboration for the IFRS Foundation and IASB.

Mr Prada reflected on Europe's adoption of IFRS and spoke about protecting the Standards in their entirety; he cautioned against customising them for use in Europe. Mr Prada cited Philippe Maystadt's draft report, warning that "a tweak here, a failure to endorse there and very quickly you can have Standards that are once again incompatible with other parts of the world. . . . We all need to be vigilant to ensure that Europe continues to be a champion in global financial accounting reporting, for the good of Europe and for the stability of the global financial system".

Mr Prada went on to examine the challenges of transparency and maintaining legitimacy. He also discussed the importance of collaboration with national and regional standard-setting bodies. The cooperation allows greater consistency in adoption, implementation and enforcement of IFRS.

The full text of the speech and a video recording of the speech are available on the IASB website.

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