IFRS For SMEs To Be Issued Tomorrow

Visitors to the International Accounting Standards Board's website, www.iasb.org, have recently been greeted with a prominent message in the upper right hand corner of the website that IASB's IFRS for SMEs - International Financial Reporting Standards for Small and Medium-Sized Entities - is "coming soon."

IASB Director of Communications Mark Byatt has confirmed to us that IFRS for SMEs will be published tomorrow (July 9).

The objective of IFRS for SMEs (formerly entitled in an earlier draft version "IFRS for Private Entities") was described in an IASB staff summary of the Feb. 2007 IFRS for SMEs Exposure Draft as follows:

• The aim of the proposed standard isto provide a simplified, self-contained set of accounting principles that are appropriatefor smaller, non-listed companies and are based on full International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRSs), developed primarily for listed companies.
• By removing choices for accounting treatment, eliminating topics that are notgenerally relevant to SMEs and simplifying methods for recognition and measurement,the resulting draft standard reduces the volume of accounting guidance applicable toSMEs by more than 85 per cent when compared with the full set of IFRSs.
• As a result,the exposure draft offers a workable, self-contained set of accounting standards that would allow investors for the first time to compare SMEs’ financial performance acrossinternational boundaries on a like for like basis.

Watch for further information about the release of IFRS for SMEs on www.iasb.org; we will post related information on FEI's website as well.