European Accounting Association |
ISSUE 9 | |||||||||
Contents:
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WINTER 2004 ISSUE
1. Editorial
2. Message from the EAA President
Date of change of the editorship of European Accounting Review
Future accepted papers for EAR
Call for Papers for Future Special Section of EAR on Conservatism in Accounting - EIASM Workshop announcements - 2005 Doctoral Colloquium details - Accounting in Europe Update
- Financial Reporting Standards Committee - Report on recent activity
- Aggressive earnings management is still a threat in the UK - Final version of GAS 15 - Management Report - is submitted for formal publications - IVSC releases 'Preliminary Final Drafts' of valuation for financial reporting and the cost approach for financial reporting - CIMA/CIPFA/ICAEW consolidation - the project continues - Trustees publish proposed changes in the IASC Foundation Constitution - International co-operation and development of the global accounting profession forms the heart of IFAC's Board and Council meetings - IFRS v US GAAP compared - Stable platform of financial standards announced - NZ aligns with Europe and Australia - Membership of IASB and FASB international Working Group of performance reporting announced - Google launches scholarly search tool
(Members: View an easy to print version of this newswire from here) | |||||||||
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EDITORIAL - | ||||||||||
The Publications Committee has decided that the website management should now be moved to Brussels to be operated into its next phase by the EIASM - who, of course, operate as the EAA Secretariat for most other administrative matters for the Association. This makes sense for the future of the Association's online provision and I wish them every success with taking on this role for the Association. A new EAA website will be launched in January as a consequence of this change. The web addresses will remain the same, but the management and hosting of the site will now be operated entirely from Brussels with other Association administration - and therefore all future queries in respect of the website should be sent to the usual address for the Secretariat - eaa@eiasm.be. The current passwords and userids you use to access the members' section of the current site will also be changing - these will, more logically than at present, become the same as you use for your EIASM profiles. Enhanced services on the new website will include direct access for all EAA members to full papers of EAR online - something we have been working to bring to you for the last two years. On behalf of the team at AccountingEducation.com - thank you for the opportunity to serve the Association. We will of course continue to operate our site (please come a visit if you haven't already). I will edit one more newsletter (March 2005 issue) before I step down from this role too and of course I will continue to be an active member of the Association so hope to see many of you in Goteborg next year, Dublin in 2006 and other exciting venues in the future. On to this issue then - as usual it contains various details on the forthcoming EAA 2005 Congress in Goteborg, Sweden. We also have the usual commentary from the President, this time announcing news of the new EAA Education Committee he announced previously he was in the process of setting up - see his full piece for details. He also announces details of the new EAR editor and co-chair of the Doctoral Colloquium. We also have our regular Thought Piece again - this time providing details of an example of 'Extreme Accounting' that is being looked at as part of the innovative 'Extended Business Reporting' project currently being run by the AICPA. We also have the first report from the EAA Financial Reporting Standards Committee (FRSC) chaired by Prof. Gunther Gebhardt. See below for details on all these items - and other regular items we provide each quarter. Andy Lymer a.lymer@accountingeducation.com The editor can be contacted at newswire@eaa-online.org | ||||||||||
MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT - | ||||||||||
The preparatory meeting for this Congress that was held from 7 to 8 October in Goteborg and demonstrated to those of us that attended this event that our colleagues from the School of Economics and Commercial Law of the Goteborg University, ably chaired by Olov Olson, are very well prepared for our visit. In my opinion there is no doubt that this Congress will be again the unique combination of the traditional values we all appreciate from EAA Congresses and an exciting mixture of original ideas and surprises prepared for us by our hosts. Having been given some insight into these plans I can assure you that you should really be looking forward to it! As I already informed you in the preceding Newsletter, during the preparatory meeting I met with the chairs of the Standing Scientific Committee, Conference Committee and Organising Committee with the aim of discussing their ideas and to ask them to develop long-term intentions and policies for each of their future activities. The meeting reached a conclusion that a Congress 'Mission Statement' should support the wider EAA strategy and also fit into a framework for all EAA activities. After the relatively broad discussion that followed this meeting, including input from all the current Management Committee members, it seems that we are reaching a consensus. I hope that I will be able to give your more details of this outcome in the next Newsletter. We have also made progress in other important areas of discussion that have been ongoing for some time in the Association - namely the specification of the new corporate governance principles and in finding suitable people to carry out the various roles implied in these new principles. In this regard I am pleased to inform you that two EAA members have already had their nomination for two positions approved by the EAA Board: Salvadore Carmona was approved as new editor of European Accounting Review from 1 January 2006 and Peter Pope to co-chair for the EAA Doctoral Colloquium. Both experts have been participating in EAA activities for a long time; it is not necessary to introduce them to you in a more detailed way. Therefore, let me congratulate them on their appointments and wish them all the best in their new roles fro the Association. As you know from e-mail you will have received, Warren Allen, the chair of the IFAC Education Committee, approached the EAA with an offer to appoint a representative to serve on the newly establishing Education Committee Consultative Advisory Group. This Group will provide a forum the Education Committee can consult on matters such as its agenda and project timetable. Let me thank all 61 EAA members that declared their interest in this Group's activities. It was not an easy task for the EAA Management Committee to select only one expert to act as our representative. Despite this fact, I believe we have chosen the right person: Richard Wilson, Professor of the Loughborough University Business School, member of AAA Education Committee and founding editor of “Accounting Education: an international journal” has been appointed the EAA representative to this Group. Let me also wish Professor Wilson all the best in his new role for us; I am convinced that he will be successful in both activities connected with this position – in gaining a strong mandate from EAA members on the issues that will be the subject of discussion and in building professional respect within the IFAC Group in supporting EAA opinions and statements. And finally: let me wish all of you, dear EAA members, a Merry Christmas and a lot of health, happiness and personal, as well as professional, satisfaction in the year 2005. Sincerely yours, Bohumil Král President EAA 2004 Kral@vse.cz | ||||||||||
EAR NEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS - http://www.eaa-online.org/EAR | ||||||||||
Communications from the Editorial Office: 1. Date of change of the editorship of European Accounting Review It has recently emerged that there may be some confusion regarding the time of change of the editorship of European Accounting Review. Please would you pay attention to the fact that Prof. Kari Lukka will continue as the Editor of EAR until the end of year 2005. Accordingly, the new Editor will step in not before than 1 January 2006, and will take care of the review processes of manuscripts submitted to EAR as of that date. However, even after 1 January 2006, Prof. Lukka will continue to process all the manuscripts submitted to the journal by the end of 2005. 2. Future accepted papers for EAR as follows:
3. Call for Papers for Future Special Section of EAR on Conservatism in Accounting Guest editors: James A. Ohlson and Laurence van Lent Accounting tends to understate the net assets on the balance sheet and to defer the recognition of gains in the income statement while losses are booked immediately. In short, accounting is conservative. Extant research suggests that accounting conservatism varies among firms, industries and countries and is much influenced by the specific institutional settings facing management. Nevertheless, accounting conservatism is still ill understood and many questions remain. European Accounting Review will issue a Special section to further understanding of these important questions. Relevant topics include, among other things:
Papers may have an analytical, theoretical, empirical or methodological focus, but should be innovative and rigorous. We especially encourage submissions that exploit differences in various institutional settings to investigate the determinants and consequences of accounting conservatism. Submitted papers considered for this special issue will be subject to double-blind review. Authors are encouraged to contact the guest editors in advance should there be any matters on which they require clarification or guidance. Submissions should be sent to the address shown below in electronic format (Word or pdf). The deadline for submissions is 1 July 2005. Contact details of the guest editors are:
Guest Editors EAR issue on Conservatism in Accounting | ||||||||||
NEWS UPDATE | ||||||||||
This news section is produced in conjunction with AccountingEducation.com - the key global community for accounting educators and researchers. Visit their website at http://accountingeducation.com/subscribe.cfm to sign up for their free weekly news alert service - called Double Entries - and join over 5,000 other weekly readers receiving weekly news such as below. | ||||||||||
EAA NEWS
[01] EIASM WORKSHOP
ANNOUNCEMENTS Accounting and related events on this list in the near future include (select the hyperlink for further details):
[02] 2005 DOCTORAL COLLOQUIUM DETAILS The KPMG European Doctoral Colloquium in Accounting to be held on the isle of Gullholmen, Sweden on May 14-17, 2005. The final details of the Colloquium have been posted to the EIASM website at the address below. Please note the deadline for applications is 31 December, 2004, however, earlier application is encouraged. Get full details on this event at - http://www.eiasm.org/frontoffice/event_announcement.asp?event_id=398
[03] ACCOUNTING IN EUROPE UPDATE
"Accounting in Europe" was published for the first time at the end of September. The Publications Committee took a decision to authorise publication of the 2005 and 2006 issues at its September meeting, and a call for papers has already been circulated to EAA members.
[04] FINANCIAL REPORTING STANDARDS COMMITTEE - REPORT ON RECENT ACTIVITY The EAA FRSC has currently three active projects: [1] IAS 39 Amendments: The Fair Value Option In July 2004 the EAA FRSC submitted a first comment letter to the IASB on its ED IAS 39 Amendments “The Fair Value Option”. [Main authors: Guenther Gebhardt (chair), Araceli Mora, Frank Thinggard]. The letter expressed a strong disagreement with the proposals in the ED – in line with most other comments except those of central banks and other regulators. The letter was also sent to EFRAG at the request of the EFRAG Chairman Stig Enevoldsen. The comment letter is posted on the IASB website: http://www.iasb.org/current/comment_letters.asp?showPageContent=no&xml=16_91_79_26072004.htm
[2] Business Combinations – Phase II The Business Combinations project still awaits the publication of the Exposure Draft announced for the 4th quarter 2004 and we will then ask interested EAA members for support. [Jan Marton (chair), Guenther Gebhardt, Martin Hoogendoorn]
[3] Accounting Standards for Small and Medium sized Enterprises
In September 2004 the EAA FRS submitted a comment letter to the IASB on the Discussion Paper “Preliminary Views on Accounting Standards for Small and Medium sized Enterprises” [Main authors: Lisa Evans (chair), Roberto di Pietra]. The letter is posted on the following website: www.iasb.org. The comment letter in particular summarizes the existing SME research in Europe. As the project will continue EAA members are invited to send any comments and hints on SME research not reflected in the comment letters to the chair of the task force - Lisa Evans (lisa.evans@ed.ac.uk). The EAA FRSC agreed in December 2004 to add the following projects to its agenda:
[4] Reporting Comprehensive Income
[5] Revenue and Related Liabilities
[6] Consolidations
The EAA FRSC will concentrate on the more basic conceptual problem areas and deliberately not respond to all the numerous limited scope projects. However, it will take up projects where members have a special interest and competence. In this spirit we added to the agenda:
[7] IAS 12 Income Taxes The EAA FRSC will present and discuss its work in a symposium at the EAA 2005 Annual Congress in Goteborg. Representatives from the IASB and from EFRAG are invited to join the panel. [Author - Professor Gunther Gebhardt] | ||||||||||
EUROPEAN NEWS -
supplied by AccountingEducation.com (Select the titles of each news item to see further details) [05] AGGRESSIVE EARNINGS MANAGEMENT STILL A THREAT IN THE UK - A report published at the end of last week by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England & Wales (ICAEW) warns that the threat of aggressive earnings management to UK corporate reporting is still with us and is likely to increase with the introduction of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). See further details in our full news item at http://www.accountingeducation.com/news/news5588.html . [06] FINAL VERSION OF GAS 15 MANAGEMENT REPORT IS SUBMITTED FOR FORMAL PUBLICATION - As a follow up to our coverage of previous stages of this process of creating a regulation for the new Management Report to be required of German companies alongside IFRS accounts, GASB has reported that at its 11th public meeting they adopted GAS 15 Management Report. The authoritative German version has been submitted to the Federal
Ministry of Justice requesting publication in the Federal Gazette pursuant to §342. See further details at http://www.accountingeducation.com/news/news5718.html . [07]
[08]
CIMA/CIPFA/ICAEW CONSOLIDATION - THE PROJECT CONTINUES - Proposals for a major consolidation initiative within the UK accountancy profession return to the spotlight over the course of the next two weeks. Council meetings of the three chartered bodies who are proposing to form a new combined institute will scrutinise the results of detailed discussions/negotiations which have taken place over the past few months. See the full news item at http://www.accountingeducation.com/news/news5727.html for further details on
the latest discussions. | ||||||||||
OTHER NEWS- supplied by AccountingEducation.com
[09] TRUSTEES PUBLISH PROPOSED CHANGES IN THE IASC FOUNDATION CONSTITUTION - The Trustees of the International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC) Foundation have published for public comment a consultation document containing their proposals to amend the IASC Foundation Constitution. The Constitution sets out the organisational framework of the IASC Foundation and the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB). For further details see http://www.accountingeducation.com/news/news5653.html . [10] INTERNATIONAL CO-OPERATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE GLOBAL ACCOUNTING PROFESSION FORMS THE HEART OF IFAC'S BOARD AND COUNCIL MEETINGS - More than 100 leaders of national accountancy institutes met in Paris at the start of November to participate in the International Federation of Accountants' (IFAC's) Board and Council meetings. This group took action on such issues as corporate governance, developing nations, convergence to international standards and other ways accountancy can contribute to economic growth and stability. See our full news item at http://www.accountingeducation.com/news/news5637.html for further details of some important agreements initiated and developed at this meeting. [11] IFRS AND US GAAP - PWC has produced a publication meant for those who wish to gain a broad understanding of the key similarities and differences between IFRS and US GAAP. It takes into account all pronouncements issued under IFRS and US GAAP up to 30 June 2004. See our full news item to access this free document online - http://www.accountingeducation.com/news/news5639.html . [12] STABLE PLATFORM OF FINANCIAL STANDARDS ANNOUNCED - NZ ALIGNS WITH UK, EUROPE AND AUSTRALIA - The Accounting Standards Review Board (ASRB) is pleased to announce the establishment of a "stable platform" of New Zealand Equivalents to International Financial Reporting Standards (NZ IFRS). These NZ IFRS will replace the existing NZ GAAP used in financial reporting, and are equivalent to international standards being applied in the European Union and Australia from 2005. See more details at http://www.accountingeducation.com/news/news5676.html . [13] MEMBERSHIP OF IASB AND FASB INTERNATIONAL WORKING GROUP ON PERFORMANCE REPORTING ANNOUNCED - The International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) has announced the membership of a new international working group that it has established jointly with the United States Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB). The working group has been set up to help the boards in their joint project to establish standards for the presentation of information in the financial statements that would improve the usefulness of that information in assessing the financial performance of a business enterprise. The working group consists of senior professionals with extensive experience in and responsibility for the preparation, analysis, audit and regulation of financial statements. See full details at http://www.accountingeducation.com/news/news5657.html . [14] GOOGLE LAUNCHES SCHOLARLY SEARCH TOOL - Google - the worlds' number 1 search engine site, yesterday launched a new service in beta form that focuses on bringing order to scholarly materials available online. See further details in our full news item at http://www.accountingeducation.com/news/news5651.html . | ||||||||||
ADVERT - | ||||||||||
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CONGRESS UPDATE - | ||||||||||
Looking forward to EAA 2005 - Göteborg, Sweden, 18-20 May, 2005.
In September the EAA Publications Committee asked the Göteborg Organising Committee to develop a separate website that should be hosted by the conference organisers and linked to the website of the Association. This new structure means that the conference organisers now have direct access to the Congress website, which improves maintenance and updates. The re-designed web-site is now implemented. 954 SUBMISSIONS The online submission system had been held open until Monday November 22, 2004. The system is now closed for further submissions. The total number of correct submissions is 954 abstracts, which includes 296 full paper submissions. The number 954 is the net amount, which means that duplicates and insufficient submissions had to be followed up by the Congress secretariat, Congrex and were removed. The Standing Scientific Committee is now starting to allocate each submission to the members of the Scientific Committee for the review process. The abstract/submission system, as well as the personal page, is closed for new submissions and changes of full papers and abstracts. On the 15th February 2005 the notification of tentative acceptance will be announced via e-mail. Then the personal page will be opened again for submission and changes of full papers. THE PREPARATORY MEETING IN GÖTEBORG 7- 8 OF OCTOBER 2004 On 7th and 8th October 2004 the preparatory meeting of the 28th EAA Congress was held in Göteborg. Besides the Göteborg organisers, the Prague and Dublin organisers as well as Nicole Coopman (EISAM representative) participated. The planned venues on the premises of the Göteborg School of Economics and Commercial Law were shown to the participants of the preparatory meeting. During the meeting the following issues were discussed:
9 SYMPOSIA The Organising Committee gladly announce that the 9 symposia at the congress almost are fully developed. The themes of the symposia are:
[Olov Olsen - Chair of the EAA 2005 Congress] | ||||||||||
OTHER EVENTS - http://www.eaa-online.org/other/index.cfm | ||||||||||
Listed
below are brief details of other (i.e non-EAA) events that we have been
notified about that we consider to be of possible interest to members
(click on titles for further details):
Further details on each event can be found on the EAA website at http://www.eaa-online.org/other/index.cfm See EAA news section above for details of other accounting events organised by EIASM. | ||||||||||
OTHER ANNOUNCEMENTS - | ||||||||||
Following are announcements notified to the EAA that may be of interest to members:
We will be pleased to make announcements that will be of relevance to members in future editions of this newsletter. The EAA however, reserves the right to make a charge for the placement of material of this nature. Send details of announcements you wish to make by email to the Editor at newsletter@eaa-online.org | ||||||||||
JOBS - | ||||||||||
Following are currently outstanding vacancies from our vacancy
advertising service offered via our website. Further details on each
position can be found on the website.
Lecturers/Senior Lecturers in Accounting & Finance - Lancaster University Management School, UK. Deadline for applications - 31 January, 2005.
Professor - Ernst & Young Chair for International Accounting and Risk Reporting - University of St. Gallen - Graduate School of Business Administration, Economics, Law and Social Science (HSG). Deadline for applications - 31 January, 2005 Our full vacancy service can be found on the EAA website at http://www.eaa-online.org/vac/index.cfm
For future editions of this newsletter, all outstanding vacancies with deadlines beyond the publication date of each issue will be listed here. If you have a vacancy you would like to have advertised to the membership please email details to the editor to have them included here, and on the website. A small charge applies for this service.
Send vacancy details by email to the Editor at jobs@eaa-online.org
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OTHER CONTENT - | ||||||||||
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The malfeasance crisis has shown that the current reporting and assurance models are inadequate for transparent reporting in a dynamic business environment. The AICPA recognized this fact by creating the Special Committee for Enhanced Business Reporting (EBRM). This committee’s Public Company Task Force created four potential models[1] for enhanced business reporting which will be passed over to the new EBRM consortium. This Consortium is being formed with a much wider constituency that includes large corporations, standard setters, regulators, users of financial information in a broad multinational context. The proposed models that range different approaches including PWC’s value reporting[2] have as a common feature a much expanded scope of reporting variables (non-financial) and alternative representation models.
The overall anachronism and conservatism of the evolution of accounting and assurance standards has created a domain of knowledge that has not kept up with the practice of business in a real-time economy. An economy with just-in-time processes, distributed supply chains, global distance e-marketing, very advanced financial engineered instruments, RFID tagged inventory, etc cannot be measured by a paper-based one-dimensional static accounting model.
The Galileo model not only offers the structure of a technologically supportive structure for very transparent disclosure but also offers some basic rules of measurement (accounting rules) to guide disclosures. Among these rules we include a proposed business reporting portal, that companies report at a very fine sector breakdown with full extended business statements and that consolidation is performed by the information user, that there is substantial disclosure of non-financial information, that organization disclose statistical and structural relationships among their process measurements and KPIs, that the values on corporate balance sheets be dynamically valued using prices posted on the Web at locations as B2B portals and E-Bays and that industry groups while setting XML derivative standards also set required disclosure variables of non-financial nature which are called “points of comparison.” This “extreme accounting” model is not expected to be implemented as proposed but to serve as the extreme of the benchmark and create the types of social compromises that are necessary to enhance the business reporting model. The database drilldown model will be strange to users and the idea of multilayered reporting while the current reality is not commonly recognized. In addition to technical development substantial education and evolution must happen for their inevitable adoption. Web-based reporting, a product of the nineties would not have been even conceivable in the 20th century but it is now part of the basic skills of the majority of information users and presents substantial improvement over the traditional paper based model. These issues offer for once the opportunity for academia to lead practice in the development of accounting thought. [2] Eccles, R.G., Hertz, R.H., Keegan, E.M., and Phillips, D.M., The Value Reporting Revolution, John Wiley & Sons, New York, 2001. [3] https://raw.rutgers.edu/raw/galileo
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DISCLAIMERS | ||||||||||
Neither the editor nor the European Accounting Association (EAA)
claims copyright over the articles or comments provided in this newswire
where alternative source is acknowledged above. In all other cases the EAA
is willing to provide an unrestricted license to use the contents of this
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permission should be sought from the editor directly for use of any of the
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appropriate by the editor.
All information provided in this newswire is offered in good faith and whilst all attempts have been made to assure the validity of the contents, they should be also be confirmed by alternative sources before being used in any way. Neither the editor nor the EAA accepts any responsibility for any adverse results brought about by use of the information contained in this newswire. All information provided by designated authors expresses the opinion of the author and may not necessarily be the opinion either of the editor or of the EAA. This newsletter is produced for members of the European Accounting Association and supplied to all members for whom a correct email address is available on the official register of members held by the EAA Secretariat at the time each issue is circulated. Archived copies of each newsletter can be found in the Members' Section of the EAA Website. Further details about the European Accounting Association, including membership details, can be found on its website at http://www.eaa-online.org/other/index.cfm. All queries related to membership of the Association should be directed to the Secretariat at eaa@eiasm.be This newsletter is produced on behalf of the EAA by AccountingEducation.com Ltd - the managers and hosts of the EAA website and of the largest academic accounting community in the world. See their website at http://accountingeducation.com/ |