List of Differences Between US GAAP and IFRS
posted by Lawrence Cunningham
Is anyone aware of the existence of a simple list of differences between the requirements of traditional US accounting (GAAP) and international financial reporting standards (IFRS)? A simple listing of the top 25 or so differences between these two systems could be a handy tool for many purposes, including for reference, research, and instruction. But I and colleagues interested in finding such a list have not been able to locate one.
This is somewhat surprising to us. After all, pending debate over moving the US from GAAP to IFRS involves a fundamental question: how convergent or divergent are the two systems? There is no question that the two differ on numerous topics in important ways. Examples include inventory, research & development costs, and leases. Extensive research explores the effects of such differences on resulting reports of net income and shareholders’ equity. But there does not appear to be a simple list of the major differences by topic.
If anyone is aware of one, I’d be grateful to know about it. Alternatively, I may create one and share it on the SSRN as a “working paper.” I would invite others to comment on it to improve its accuracy and also update it as the two sets of standards continue to change.
August 29, 2008 at 7:31 am
Posted in: Securities
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Responses (4)
Nathan Wagner - August 29, 2008 at 9:12 am
Take a look at http://www.ifrsaccounting.com/ifrs-gaap.html which seems to be what you’re looking for.
David Zaring - August 30, 2008 at 4:18 pm
You know, I was just wondering about this. Kevin Young has done it for the beginning and the end of Basel. But I don’t think Mattli and Buthe or anyone else has done it in IFRS … not that I’d know for sure.
Martina - November 21, 2008 at 11:32 pm
With the successful completion of the IASCs standards, IFRS and US GAAP were placed as the two pre-eminent world financial reporting frameworks. For years, however, US GAAP was accepted widely as the international set of standards to ensure high quality financial statements. Especially in the US, but also elsewhere, the introduction of IFRS has lead to a discussion on the quality of both regimes. However, relatively little research has been devoted to the subject. In this study, we address that void and further compare the quality of the two standard regimes using a sample of German New Market firms. Financial statement quality is measured applying multiple earnings attributes traditionally used in accounting research. Consistently throughout our measures, we find that the quality of US GAAP prepared financial statements and IFRS information is overall very comparable. Only with regard to predictive ability of accounting information do we find US GAAP superiority.
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Martina
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Martina - November 21, 2008 at 11:36 pm
With the successful completion of the IASCs standards, IFRS and US GAAP were placed as the two pre-eminent world financial reporting frameworks. For years, however, US GAAP was accepted widely as the international set of standards to ensure high quality financial statements. Especially in the US, but also elsewhere, the introduction of IFRS has lead to a discussion on the quality of both regimes. However, relatively little research has been devoted to the subject. In this study, we address that void and further compare the quality of the two standard regimes using a sample of German New Market firms. Financial statement quality is measured applying multiple earnings attributes traditionally used in accounting research. Consistently throughout our measures, we find that the quality of US GAAP prepared financial statements and IFRS information is overall very comparable. Only with regard to predictive ability of accounting information do we find US GAAP superiority.
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Martina
iowa drug rehab
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