The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and the United Nations Global Compact have announced that they will launch the first outcome publication of their Action Platform for Business Reporting on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on 21 September 2017. According to the press release on the GRI website, the publication An Analysis of the Goals and Targets "demystifies the esoteric world of sustainability disclosures" for companies seeking to report their impact on the SDGs.

The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and the World Federation of Exchanges (WFE) have published a report examining the role of stock exchanges in promoting economic growth and sustainable development. The report notes that by mid-2017 there were 32 stock exchanges providing formal guidance to issuers on reporting environmental, social, and governance (ESG) information and that stock exchanges, through their ability to influence the reporting behaviour of their listed entities, are successfully generating a rapid uptake in sustainability disclosure. Please click to access the report on the WFE website.

The United Nations Sustainable Stock Exchanges (SSE) initiative announces that the Shanghai Stock Exchange, one of the largest exchanges in the world, has joined the SSE initiative as the first exchange from China. Please click for the press release on the SSE website.

The briefing paper covers:

• Development of IFRS 9 and expected loss accounting
• Regulatory expected loss
• Staging of provisions
• Complexities of presenting and understanding the new information

The briefing note covers an understanding of the role of banks, changes required by IFRS 9 and the expected effect on banks in applying its requirements.

Please click for the two documents on the ICAEW website:

• Briefing paper
• Briefing note

The topics covered during the meeting were the following (numbers in brackets are ref­er­ences to the cor­re­spond­ing para­graphs of the summary):

• Disclosure initiative — Principles of disclosure (1–17): ASAF members provided feedback gathered from stakeholders in their jurisdictions.
• Goodwill and impairment (18–35): ASAF members provided comments on two papers which summarized analyst views on financial information about goodwill and possible approach to impairment losses on goodwill. Further, the ASAF members discussed the single-model approach as well as the indicator-only approach to impairment testing for goodwill.
• Accounting policy changes (36–46): ASAF members discussed the impracticability threshold for voluntary changes in accounting policy and whether the proposed threshold should consider the benefits and costs of retrospective application.
• Post-implementation review of IFRS 13 (47–53): ASAF members were updated on the request for information for the post-implementation review of IFRS 13 and were presented with phase 2 plans for the PIR.
• Primary financial statements (54–67): ASAF members provided feedback on proposals for the presentation in the statement of financial performance of (a) EBIT, (b) management performance measure and adjust earnings per share, and (c) share of profit or loss of associates and joint ventures.
• Property, plant and equipment (68–74): ASAF members provided preliminary views on the proposed amendments to IAS 16.
• Project updates and agenda planning (75–78): ASAF members were updated on (1) investor engagement activities since the issuance of IFRS 17, (2) proposed amendments to IFRS 9, and (3) current IASB projects.
• Wider corporate reporting (79–89): ASAF members provided views on prominence and importance of wider corporate reporting and whether to revise its 2010 Practice Statement Management Commentary.
• Amendments to IFRS 8 and IAS 34 (90–102): ASAF members discussed four proposals in the exposure draft, Improvements to IFRS 8 Operating Segments.
• Rate-regulated activities (103–112): ASAF members were updated on recent Board discussions on defined rate regulation and discussed the analysis of rights and obligations arising from a rate-regulated mechanism in a regulatory agreement.

A full summary of the meeting is available on the IASB's website.

This issue features discussions on:

• New metrics for evaluating the performance of insurers.
• Premiums versus insurance revenue.
• Contractual service margin.
• Disclosures and ratios.

For more information, see the issue on the IASB’s Web site.

Both organisations have a public interest mission and the transparency created by appropriate disclosures as a result of rigorous accounting standards promotes financial stability and enhances market discipline.

The Memorandum of Understanding notes two priorities of interaction:

• Fostering the sharing of information and the BCBS members’ views in support of work in the development of IFRS Standards and sharing information to support the understanding of interactions between IFRS Standards and the BCBS Framework.
• Fostering the sharing of information to support both parties in their work in the application of IFRS Standards on a globally consistent basis.

Please click to access the following information of the IASB website:

• Press release
• Memorandum of Understanding

The article is certainly also intended as a reminder that comments on the request for information published as part of the post-implementation of IFRS 13 are due 22 September 2017.

The main reason for the article, however, seems to be expectation management. As Mr Kabureck explains, the post-implementation review process is not intended to be a cover-to-cover reconsideration of the entire underlying standard. Rather, the main aim of the process is to look at the following questions:

• Have the standard’s objectives been achieved?
• Are difficult or challenging requirements performing as intended?
• Have new issues emerged since the standard was issued? 
• Are the compliance costs consistent with expectations?

And yet Mr Kabureck notes that even if potential improvements are identified the Board might conclude that it will make no changes to the standard:

This is because our constituents also want a stable financial reporting platform and minor changes may not pass the cost-benefit test; processing even minor changes still consumes a significant amount of both constituents' time and the Board's time.

Please click to access the full article on the IASB website.

Finalisation of draft agenda decisions

The Committee will consider the public feedback on six matters which it had tentatively decided not to add to its agenda:

• IFRS 9 Financial Instruments - Financial assets eligible for the election to present changes in fair value in other comprehensive income - Agenda Paper 5A
• IAS 12 Income Taxes - Interest and penalties - Agenda Paper 5B
• IFRS 1 First-time Adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards - Subsidiary as a first-time adopter - Agenda Paper 5C
• IAS 37 Provisions, Contingent Liabilities and Contingent Assets - Costs considered in assessing whether a contract is onerous - Agenda Paper 5D
• Goods acquired for promotional activities - Agenda Paper 5E
• Acquisition of an associate or joint venture from an entity under common control - Agenda Paper 5F

The staff are recommending that the Committee finalise all of these decisions. In one case, onerous contracts, the staff are also recommending that the IASB be asked to add a narrow scope project to its work plan.

New issues

There are three new issues:

• IFRS 15 Revenue from Contracts with Customers — Pattern of revenue recognition in a real estate contract – Initial consideration - Agenda Paper 2
• IAS 41 Agriculture — Taxation in fair value measurements – Initial consideration - Agenda Paper 3
• IAS 28 Investments in Associates and Joint Ventures — Contributing property, plant & equipment to an associate – Initial consideration - Agenda Paper 4

For all three issues the staff are recommending that the IC not add the issue to its agenda. However in the case of the fair value measurement for agriculture, the staff are recommending that the IASB make a small change to IAS 41 as part of its next Annual Improvements cycle to correct an inconsistency in IAS 41.

Further information

The full agenda for the meeting and our pre-meeting summaries can be found here. We will update this page for any changes to the agenda and our Deloitte observer notes from the meeting as they become available.

The symposium on accounting research will gather together academics, international standard-setting representatives, finance and accounting directors, chartered accountants and external auditors around series of round tables on the accounting challenges linked to the technological evolutions and the digitalisation of the economy. In particular, debates will deal with how such evolutions may impact our current accounting and financial rules and if these rules remain relevant to assess understandability and performance of the digital businesses. Participation in the symposium is free of charge, however, prior registration is required.

Please click for more information and registration on the ANC website.