Reconstructing financial statements

This paper introduces a tool for the reconstruction and validation of categorized totals embedded in untrusted and unformatted text, such as OCR scans of nancial statements. The tool is a spino of academic research into the funding of Japanese third-sector organizations, the annual reports of which are frequently published reports in the form of PDF les containing document images. A number of techniques at string- line- and document-level are used to resolve ambiguities and obtain the greatest possible recovery rate for the underlying data, while excluding the content of untrustworthy documents from the nal sample. In a preliminary trial \in the wild", the tool has returned validated income totals for 47.9% of the documents in a heterogeous set of 2205 annual reports

FASB: Making Financial Statements Mysterious

Since the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2002, the Financial Accounting Standards Board has passed rules that it promises will make corporate accounting more transparent. In fact, its revised Generally Accepted Accounting Principles have made it difficult for investors -- or even CEOs -- to understand a company's financial report. The first step in the wrong direction came when FASB mandated that companies list "intangibles" such as "goodwill" as corporate assets, artificially inflating balance sheets. After that, FASB meddled with the revenue recognition rules, in some cases not allowing companies to report revenue from cash payments received from a customer for a delivered product. Finally, and worst by far, FASB mandated punitive and nonsensical rules for so-called expensing of stock options. These accounting burdens, combined with the onerous yet ineffective mandates of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, are starting to take a real toll on American businesses and markets. In 2007, only $8.5 billion or 7.7 percent of the total$109 billion in issuances of Initial Public Offerings were launched on U.S. stock exchanges, down from 60.8 percent a decade ago

Further Education Funding Council : circular : 99/23 : sector accounting policies

"Revised model financial statements and accounting guidance. Financial statements for the year ending 31 July 1999 are requested by 31 December 1999" -- front cover

Determination of audit activity in modern conditions

The task of compulsory audit of financial statements is the provision of reasonable assurance that is accepted and performed by the entity in accordance with the requirements of this Law and international standards of audit by checking the financial statements or consolidated financial statements in order to express an independent opinion of the auditor on its compliance with all significant aspects and compliance with the requirements of international financial reporting standards or national accounting (statutory) standards and laws of Ukraine

The illusion of comparable European IFRS financial statements. Beliefs of auditors, analysts and other users

Reaching higher comparability was one of the main goals of the implementation of the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) in the European Union in 2005. However, national accounting traditions and cultural differences continue to cause differences in the application of IFRS (KPMG & von Keitz, 2006). European IFRS financial statements might therefore be less comparable than users of these statements possibly assume. This study contributes by determining to what extent auditors, analysts and other users of European IFRS financial statements believe that these statements are comparable and what they perceive to be the most important problem areas when it comes to comparability. Our survey of 426 individuals reveals that only 41% of the respondents believe that European IFRS financial statements are comparable. The more experienced respondents are, the less they believe in the comparability of these statements. Overall, 13 areas are perceived as problematic for the comparability of IFRS financial statements by at least half of the respondents. The three main issues that appear in most of these problem areas are interpretation differences, subjectivity and disclosure differences.Comparability, European IFRS financial statements, survey

Determination of audit activity in modern conditions

The task of compulsory audit of financial statements is the provision of reasonable assurance that is accepted and performed by the entity in accordance with the requirements of this Law and international standards of audit by checking the financial statements or consolidated financial statements in order to express an independent opinion of the auditor on its compliance with all significant aspects and compliance with the requirements of international financial reporting standards or national accounting (statutory) standards and laws of Ukraine

IAS 27 Consolidated and Separate Financial Statements - A Closer Look

The International Accounting Standards Committee issued the the International Accounting Standard 27, Consolidated and Separate Financial Statements. IAS 27 provides guidance on the preparation and presentation of consolidated financial statements for a group of entities under the control of a parent. The standard also provides guidance on the presentation of investments in subsidiaries, jointly controlled entities and associates in separate financial statements. The objective of IAS 27 is to enhance the relevance, reliability, and comparability of the information contained in consolidated financial statements that a parent prepares for the group of entities it controls; and separate (non-consolidated) financial statements that a parent, investor, or venturer elects to provide, or is required by local regulation to provide. This article presents a closer look of the standard (objective, scope, definitions and disclosures).International Accounting Standard; Consolidated Financial Statements; Minority Interest; Subsidiary; IAS 27; IASC; IASB

CONSIDERATIONS ON AUDIT OF GROUP FINANCIAL STATEMENTS

The objective of this paper is to present a comparative analysis of the consolidatedfinancial statements according to the International Financial Reporting Standards or the EuropeanDirectives and see how such accounting alternative affect the explanatory notes to the consolidatedfinancial statements, especially regarding to the revaluation basis of the assets. The study seeks todetermine if the accounting diversity influences the work of the financial auditor. The resultsindicate that the two frameworks in elaborating the consolidated financial statements have asignificant ascendancy on the audit of the group financial statements.Consolidated Financial Statements, The 7th European Directive, Financial Audit