On better communication Mr Hoogervorst offered no new insights but confirmed that the IASB feels that it now have a good suite of standards that cover the vast majority of transactions and would, therefore, prioritise better presentation and formatting of the information in the financial statements in the coming years. Similarly, on support of implementation and application he mainly stressed the importance of the work of the IFRS Interpretations Committee but offered no detailed insights.

Turning then to wider corporate reporting, Mr Hoogervorst stated that the IASB is often asked questions about its role this space and that some constituents would like the IASB to play a more central role in trying to create more uniformity in the multitude of sustainability standards. He admitted:

[T]he IASB knows that financial reporting in the narrow sense has its limitations. There are many elements of value creation which are important to the investor but which are not adequately captured in the financial statements. Investors need to understand a company’s business model and its strategy for long-term value creation. They need to understand the intangibles that are vital to their business model. And, yes, sustainability issues can also be important for long-term value creation in certain industries, just think of mining and car manufacturing.

And yet he also stated:

Let me be clear; we do not plan to get into environmental and sustainability reporting. That is not our area of expertise. There are many other players. Our remit is, and will remain, financial reporting—with focus on the participants in the capital markets. That is investors and potential creditors.

In conclusion, Mr Hoogervorst offered that there has been a lot of development in this area since 2010 when the IASB published its Management Commentary Practice Statement and the therefore, the IASB "is considering" whether to update the practice statement to capture the developments. (This topic is indeed on the IASB's agenda for its meeting next week - see our summary of the agenda paper).

The full text of Mr Hoogervorst speech is available on the IASB website.

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

• Primary financial state­ments (1–15): ASAF members discussed (1) the results of a New Zealand user-needs survey related to alternative performance measures and (2) feedback from the UK Financial Reporting Council’s Discussion Paper Improving the Statement of Cash Flows.
• Rate-regulated activities (16–27): ASAF members received an updated on the Board’s discussion on a possible new accounting model for activities subject to defined rate regulation and identified factors to considered in three areas: (1) nature of the asset, (2) appropriate discount rate to use with discounting is used, and (3) timing of recognition of gain or loss under certain conditions.
• Definition of a business (28–36): ASAF members provided feedback on the Board’s tentative decisions reached at its April and June 2017 meetings.
• Goodwill and impairment (37–51): ASAF members provided views on the following approaches to improve the impairment testing of goodwill: (1) goodwill accretion approach, (2) pre-acquisition headroom approach, and (3) single method.
• Project updates and agenda planning (52–53): ASAF members were updated on the IASB technical projects and how the IASB used the ASAF advice from previous meetings.

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

• IFRS 16 specifies how an IFRS reporter will recognise, measure, present and disclose leases. The standard provides a single lessee accounting model, requiring lessees to recognise assets and liabilities for all leases unless the lease term is 12 months or less or the underlying asset has a low value. Lessors continue to classify leases as operating or finance, with IFRS 16’s approach to lessor accounting substantially unchanged from its predecessor, IAS 17.
• Recognition of Deferred Tax Assets for Unrealised Losses (Amendments to IAS 12) amends IAS 12 Income Taxes to address diversity in practice around the recognition of a deferred tax asset that is related to a debt instrument measured at fair value that has arisen because of uncertainty about the application of some of the principles in IAS 12.
• Disclosure Initiative (Amendments to IAS 7) amends IAS 7 Statement of Cash Flows to clarify that entities shall provide disclosures that enable users of financial statements to evaluate changes in liabilities arising from financing activities.
• Clarifications to IFRS 15 'Revenue from Contracts with Customers' amends IFRS 15 Revenue from Contracts with Customers to clarify three aspects of the standard (identifying performance obligations, principal versus agent considerations, and licensing) and to provide some transition relief for modified contracts and completed contracts.
• Applying IFRS 9 'Financial Instruments' with IFRS 4 'Insurance Contracts' (Amendments to IFRS 4) amends IFRS 4 Insurance Contracts to provide two options for entities that issue insurance contracts within the scope of IFRS 4: the so-called overlay approach and the so-called deferral approach. The application of both approaches is optional.

The European Union effective date is the same as the IASB in case of all pronouncements. However, the text adopted for the IFRS 4 amendments includes a "top up" that allows a financial conglomerate to elect that none of its entities operating in the insurance sector apply IFRS 9 in the consolidated financial statements for financial years the commencement of which precedes 1 January 2021 where certain conditions are met.

The Commission Regulations amending Regulation (EC) No 1126/2008 adopting certain international accounting standards in accordance with Regulation (EC) No 1606/2002 of the European Parliament and of the Council were all published in the Official Journal of the European Union on 9 November 2017.

As a result of the EU's adoption, the EFRAG has updated its endorsement status report.

The IPSASB's current cash basis standard was published in January 2003. It establishes requirements for the preparation and presentation of a statement of cash receipts and payments and supporting accounting policy notes. It also includes encouraged disclosures that enhance the cash basis report.

In an exposure draft published in February 2016, the IPSASB proposed to revise certain requirements and to recast them as encouragements. The draft also proposed amendments to ensure that the existing requirements and encouragements of the standard are better aligned with the equivalent accrual IPSAS, unless there is a reason to deviate as a result of adopting the cash basis of accounting.

These proposals have now been finalised and the preparation of consolidated financial statements, the disclosure of information about external and other assistance, and the disclosure of information about payments made by third parties are now voluntary and not longer mandatory.

The new IPSAS takes effect on 1 January 2019, with earlier adoption encouraged. Please click to access the press release and the new IPSAS on the IPSASB website.

Editorial corrections do not change the meaning or application of pronouncements, but instead correct inadvertent errors. The editorial corrections can be viewed on the editorial corrections page of the IASB's website.

Monday 11 December 2017, 9:00 - 18:00

• Opening remarks
• Updates and future trends from 2015 and 2016 symposium topics
  • Conceptual Framework: Beyond traditions, a European dynamic?
    • Policy paper
    • Roundtable
    • Address: Is digitalisation a test for Conceptual frameworks?
  • Performance: Is a convergence possible on key indicators?
    • Two policy papers
    • Roundtable
    • Address
• Risks and gains of digital transformation for accounting standard-setting
  • The digital economy: New paradigms
    • presentation
  • Impact of digitalisation on financial information: New definitions, new ways of publishing, new ways of qualification?
    • Policy paper
    • Roundtable
    • Address on “a framework for a digital reporting”
  • Financial information being tested by the digital economy: New concepts for new transactions?
    • Policy paper
    • Roundtable
    • Address
  • European public good and the accounting challenges of the digital economy
    • Roundtable
• Closing remarks

Details on the presenters, roundtable participants and speakers are available in the programme on the ANC website.

In the endorsement advice letter to the European Commission, the EFRAG has concluded that IFRIC 23 meets all technical endorsement criteria and is conductive to the European public good. A final en­dorse­ment of IFRIC 17 is currently expected in 2018.

The updated en­dorse­ment status report, dated 6 November 2017, is available here.

There are four topics on the agenda.

Tuesday 14 November 

The meeting starts with a continuation of the discussion on the Primary Financial Statements. There are three topics at this meeting: presentation of an investing category in the statement(s) of financial performance; definition of finance income/expenses; and better ways to communicate other comprehensive income.

The second topic is a proposal to add a new project called Wider Corporate Reporting. The focus of the project would be a review of the Practice Statement issued in 2010 on Management Commentary. The staff are recommending that the IASB update the Practice Statement to help address the lack of alignment and integration between wider corporate reporting and financial reporting.

The Board published Exposure Draft Improvements IFRS 8 Operating Segments (Proposed amendments to IFRS 8 and IAS 34) in March 2017. The IASB will discuss a summary of the feedback received and the areas the staff think might warrant further analysis. Respondents had mixed views on the proposals. The three main areas the staff plan to focus on in analysing the feedback are the proposed clarifications to help identify the CODM;  linking IFRS 8 segments with other parts of the annual reporting package; and clarifications to the criteria for aggregating segments.

The meeting finishes with a discussion of Dynamic Risk Management. The Staff will present the Board with the objectives of the proposed model for dynamic risk management and an outline of the proposed model. The focus of the model is to reflect how financial institutions manage the dynamic net interest margin resulting from typical banking book assets and liabilities by using derivatives to align the asset profile with the target net interest margin profile.  The staff are recommending that the Board develop a cash flow hedge accounting model for accounting for dynamic risk management.

More information

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

The agenda for the DPOC meeting is summarised below.

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

The Board will discuss the following:

• Primary financial state­ments
• Wider corporate reporting
• IFRS 8 amendments
• Dynamic risk man­age­ment

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.