ABSTRACT
The goal of the IFRS Foundation and the IASB is to ‘develop, in the public interest, a single set of high-quality, understandable, enforceable and globally accepted financial reporting standards based upon clearly articulated principles’. Prior to the introduction of IFRS, each jurisdiction developed its own set of ‘generally accepted accounting principles’ with the result that transactions concluded in different countries could be accounted for and disclosed differently despite being virtually identical in terms of their economic substance. Needless to say, for capital providers to make informed investment decisions, comparability of financial statements is of great importance. This is especially true for deregulated capital markets where investors are able to operate across borders and buy and sell shares in almost any listed company.
