The Challenge
“The better the information produced, the greater analysts insight will be - they will be able to see the real value in the company and this will be reflected in the share price” PricewaterhouseCoopers survey respondent.
Recently, one company prepared its first financial statement according to International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and was shocked to see that its return on investment appeared to have fallen from 16% to 3%. Suddenly, it became clear to this company that the change to IFRS was about much more than number-crunching. Although European companies are making good progress transitioning to IFRS, most companies are not taking steps to embed IFRS effectively within the company.
Financial reporting that is not easily understood by global users is unlikely to bring new business or capital to a company. This is why so many are either voluntarily changing to IFRS or being required to by their governments or supervisors.
In making the change to IFRS, you are adopting a global financial reporting language that will enable your company to:
- Be understood in a global marketplace - many have already found that it helps them to access world capital markets;
- Reduce costs and position yourselves as international players;
- Communicate in one language to global stakeholders; this enhances confidence in the business and improves finance-raising capabilities;
- Apply common accounting across your subsidiaries, which can improve internal communications and the quality of management reporting and group decision-making;
- Ease acquisitions and divestments through greater certainty and consistency of accounting interpretation.
Why PricewaterhouseCoopers ?
PricewaterhouseCoopers has recognised for some time that using the IFRS concepts can dramatically improve the quality of financial reporting and international investor confidence.
Whether you are trying to understand the impact of mandatory IFRS adoption on your business or simply contemplating a feasibility study, PricewaterhouseCoopers can help. We are uniquely positioned to ensure that there are no nasty surprises and that the benefits of using internationally accepted standards make a real difference to your business.
We have teams focusing, among others, on the following
specialist areas:
- IFRS training services;
- Employee benefits and stock options;
- Financial Instruments: valuation of derivatives, hedging, disclosures, etc…;
- Intangibles and impairment valuations;
- Securitization;
- Consolidation;
- Income and deferred taxes;
- Presentation of Financial Statements;
- IFRS for funds;
- Etc, …
Actions you can expect to take:
- Perform Gap analysis between current reporting requirements and IFRS;
- Organise IFRS training sessions, from introduction to more advanced;
- Adapt annual reports and accounting manuals;
- Change or adapt management information systems;
- Review IT systems and assess their limitations;
- Assess IT service provider;
- Revise IT systems to obtain requisite data;
- Design group reporting packages to gather information from subsidiaries;
- Liaise with authorities;
- Integrate and embed internal and external reporting requirements.
