IFRS 15 — ESMA believes the IASB has identified the right issues, calls for clear documentation of impacts of differences between IASB and FASB

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08 Oct 2015

The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) has commented on the IASB exposure draft ED/2015/6 'Clarifications to IFRS 15'.

ESMA agrees with the proposed clarifications to IFRS 15 but regrets regrets that the IASB and FASB were not able to maintain convergence between their standards. Nevertheless, the comment letter states:

ESMA agrees that the IASB identified the right issues that require clarification from the TRG discussions and that no further clarification on the issues for which amendments are proposed by the FASB is required at this stage. [...] Regarding any further standard-setting process related to IFRS 15, unless a major flaw of the standard is identified, any remaining minor issues to be identified by the implementation process could be addressed by referring the issue for consideration to the IFRS Interpretation Committee or to the post-implementation review.

ESMA urges the two Boards to maintain their efforts to keep the standards as convergent as possible and to discuss emerging issues together until the date of mandatory adoption of IFRS 15. Also, ESMA supports the IASB’s decision to include a discussion in the Basis for Conclusions to the ED of the potential impacts on convergence for each of the issues where either the IASB or the FASB have decided to propose different amendments to their respective standards. ESMA urges the IASB to keep track of the differences and clearly communicate them, updating the comparison as the Boards’ proposals are finalised or new differences emerge.

Please click to access the full comment letter on the ESMA website.

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