There are eight topics on the agenda.

Tuesday 20 February

Disclosure Initiative

The Board will discuss the detailed feedback received on the Disclosure Initiative—Principles of Disclosure Discussion Paper. There are 12 papers for this session, plus a cover note.

Primary Financial Statements

The Staff are responding to the Board’s request in January to clarify what is meant by a ‘key performance measure’ and a measure that is ‘specified or defined in IFRS Standards’. The staff are also recommending that when a management performance measure (MPM) is reported an adjusted EPS that is calculated consistently with the MPM must be presented, together with supporting disclosures.  Finally, the staff are also recommending that, within the investing section of the statement of cash flows, a distinction be made between cash flows arising from integral and non-integral associates and joint ventures.

Thursday 22 February

Dynamic Risk Management

In this paper, the Staff set out the qualifying criteria for designating an item into the asset profile, which defines which items are managed for interest rate risk and are therefore subject to performance assessment under the DRM model. They also discuss some technicalities about designation and situations requiring de-designation, as well as documentation requirements.

Business Combinations under Common Control

The Staff are recommending that the Board use the acquisition method in IFRS 3 as the starting point in developing proposals for accounting for business combinations for which all of the parties to the combination are under common control.

Research

The Staff will give the Board a status update on its research programme. The Staff are recommending that the Board start work in the next few months on variable and contingent consideration; provisions; extractive activities; pension benefits that depend on asset returns; and SMEs that are subsidiaries. Work on equity method; pollutant pricing mechanisms; high inflation (the scope of IAS 29); and post-implementation reviews of IFRS 10-12; and IFRS 5 should commence in 2019 or early 2020.

Insurance

The staff will give the Board a summary of the first Insurance Contracts TRG meeting. 

Analysis of due process documents

This Staff have set out for the Board the different purposes of Discussion Papers (DP) and Exposure Drafts (ED). This session is being held in anticipation of the Board’s decisions about whether it should publish a DP or an ED for the projects on primary financial statements, goodwill and impairment as well as rate-regulated activities.

Rate regulated Activities

The staff are recommending that the model being developed specify the unit of account as the individual timing differences (as opposed to the net of all timing differences) arising from the regulatory agreement. The staff also explain why they consider that rate-regulated rights and obligations meet the revised definitions of assets and a liabilities in the forthcoming Conceptual Framework.

More information

Our pre-meeting summaries are available on our February meeting note page and will be supplemented with our popular meeting notes after the meeting.

The complete set of information around the TRG meeting is now:

• audio recordings of the individual sessions
• meeting summary
• podcast (7 minutes)
• IFRS in Focus — Transition Resource group discusses implementation of IFRS 17 'Insurance Contracts'

In an appendix, the ED lists these two changes in comparison to IFRS 17:

Please click to access the ED on the ICAI website. Comments are requested by 31 March 2018.

The purpose of the fitness check exercise will be to assess whether the public reporting obligations including financial and non-financial reporting requirements for EU companies are meeting their objectives (effectiveness, relevance and EU added value). It will cover various reporting requirements including the Accounting Directive including the Non-Financial Reporting Directive, the Regulation on International Accounting Standards (IAS Regulation), the Transparency Directive (TD), the Banks Accounts Directive, and the Insurance Accounts Directive.

The Commission aims to assess whether the EU financial reporting framework is still fit for purpose. Aspects in this context are cross border businesses in a more integrated Single Market and well-functioning capital markets, the emergence of new business models, the increasing importance of intangibles in the digital economy, and the role of IFRSs and their interaction with the broader EU accounting framework. The Commission also notes the increased demand for public reporting on a broader range of topics as for example reporting on sustainability issues and long term value creation. Interaction and integration of the different sets of public reporting by companies (financial, non-financial and other reports) will also be looked at. And finally, the Commission will look at digitalisation and its long-term challenges and opportunities.

The first step in this fitness check will be an open public consultation that is expected to be launched in 1st quarter of 2018 and will last for a period of at least 12 weeks. In particular, participants will be asked for their views on the following:

1. Whether the current financial reporting framework meets its objectives and will continue to do so in the digital economy, whether the level of harmonisation and simplification meets the needs of respectively the large cross border groups and the SMEs, the role of IFRS for non-listed and listed companies including governance aspects to ensure these are not detrimental to long term and sustainable investments, and the coherence of sectoral accounting legislation for banks and insurance companies with other EU reporting and prudential legislations;
2. Whether the financial and non-financial disclosures in the area of Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) reporting by companies are fit for purpose, including as regards sustainability disclosures;
3. Whether to encourage experimentation with integrated reporting as a way to make the EU reporting framework more effective and efficient and if yes how;
4. Whether public corporate reporting does take enough consideration of – and at least is not a hindrance to – technological progress and how to make the best use of these new tools to do more with less.

Please click to access the full fitness check roadmap on the EC website. Note that roadmaps can also be commented on - feedback on this roadmap is requested by 8 March 2018.

The High-Level Expert Group (HLEG) on Sustainable Finance, established by the EC, has also suggested in its final report setting out strategic recommendations for a financial system that supports sustainable investments that changes to the IAS Regulation might be warranted.

A summary of the agenda is set out below:

Agenda papers for the meeting are available on the IASB website.

The Compendium of ITFG Clarification Bulletins addresses 104 issues and is indexed by standard. It is available on the website of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI).

The Board will discuss the following:

• Disclosure initiative: Principles of disclosures
  • Summary of feedback received
• Primary financial statements
  • Clarifying requirements for management performance measures (MPMs)
  • Management-defined adjusted earnings per share (EPS)
  • Presentation of the cash flows of 'integral' and 'non-integral' associates and joint ventures
• Dynamic risk management
  • Role of asset profile
• Business combinations under common control
• Research Programme
• Insurance contracts
  • Update on TRG meeting and activities for investors and analysts
• Discussion papers and exposure drafts
• Rate-regulated activities
  • Unit of account and asset/liability definitions

The full agenda for the meeting can be found here. We will post any updates to the agenda, our com­pre­hen­sive pre-meet­ing summaries as well as observer notes from the meeting on this page as they become available.

Video recordings of the welcome speech and the panel discussion are now available:

• Welcome speech by Michel Prada (approx. 8 minutes, available on YouTube)
• Panel discussion on 'Hong Kong and IFRS Standards: past, present and future' - featuring Hans Hoogervorst as a panelist (approx. 1 hour, available on YouTube)

The think tank Center for ESG Research has released the Integrated Ratio Guideline, which aims to be a practical formula collection for companies, investors and analysts, to help them calculate a number of non-financial and integrated ratios, and notably what investors and analysts can use these ratios for to evaluate companies’ performance and risk profiles. You can find the Center for ESG Research's Integrated Ratio Guideline here.

The World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) has released a new report, compiling data that offers a closer look into the reporting landscape of the United States and Canada. This first report in a series of case studies across different countries that looks at significant developments in ESG reporting seeks to address the challenges, opportunities and next steps for corporate reporting and disclosure. Please click to access the report here.

The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and the WBCSD have launched the 'Materiality Roundtable Series', a platform for companies and investors that helps organisations to identify and integrate sustainability information into their corporate reporting. Please click for more information on the GRI website.

GRI also announces that the GRI Standards now available in Simplified Chinese. Please click for access to the press release and the download centre on the GRI website.

Mr Anderson’s response provided his views related to the important role analysis reports play when making investment decisions as well as arguments to Professor Lev’s comments regarding the (1) growth of intangibles, (2) impact of financial reporting, and (3) role of standard-setters. In addition, he commented on two proposed accounting changes Professor Lev believed will ‘restore the income statement matching.’ These proposals were to capitalize selected intangibles and the treatment of ‘one-off’ costs.

For more information, see Mr Anderson’s response on the IASB’s website.