IASB seeks overseer for its decisions

The International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) is discussing the needs for a committee to oversee its actions in response to concerns from some countries that have been proposing carve-outs to the global standards in an effort to have their own interests served.

David Tweedie, IASB chairman, told CFO.com editors the board would officially announce its plan for putting together such a group, and give details next week. He said the group could function similarly to the SEC's oversight of the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB).

The committee could maintain equanimity over the varying interests represented on the standards board and act as an ‘endorsement mechanism’ to ensure it operated in the public interest, allaying fears of SEC becoming a global regulator and the transfer of USA’s complex GAAP rules to their countries.

Mr Tweedie said IASB was working to get rid of the carve-outs, particularly EU's change to IAS 39. He noted the controversial differences over IAS 39 amounted to a ‘mere seven paragraphs’ of the 2,000 pages of rules and was largely a matter of semantics as some banks felt they could hedge under IFRS and others did not.

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