McGladrey & Pullen, LLP believes the objective of a single set of high-quality global accounting standards is in the interests of the global capital markets and investors. We do not believe the rest of the world will accept U.S. generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) as a global framework. As such, it is in the best interests of the global economy and investors everywhere for the U.S. to convert to International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) for filings with the SEC. Therefore, our Firm generally supports the SEC’s Proposed Roadmap for the Potential Use of Financial Statements Prepared in Accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards by U.S. Issuers and the related proposed rule providing certain issuers with the option to prepare their financial statements in accordance with IFRS beginning with SEC filings in 2010.
We also strongly support the efforts of both the U.S. Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) and the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) to converge U.S. GAAP and IFRS, and we support the continuation of these convergence efforts into the future.
In our letter of comment on the proposed roadmap, our firm agreed that the SEC should make its decision in 2011 regarding the rulemaking necessary for mandatory adoption of IFRS. However, we also recommended that the SEC carefully monitor and evaluate the progress made after 2011 by issuers as they progress through the IFRS conversion process and consider deferring the mandatory reporting dates beyond 2014, if warranted. Further, we stated our support for the SEC’s proposal to permit early adoption of IFRS for filings with the SEC. However, we believe it is not likely that eligible U.S. companies will choose this option because of the uncertainty of a future mandate, the potential for required reversion to U.S. GAAP, and the potential additional requirement to continue to reconcile to U.S. GAAP. If an early adoption program is to be effectively utilized, we believe companies should be given the option of adopting IFRS without the uncertainty surrounding a possible reversion to U.S. GAAP and without the added requirement of reconciling from IFRS to U.S. GAAP on an ongoing basis.
Our comment letter is available in full here
View the SEC’s proposed roadmap in full |
