Unanimous confirmation of Scope 3 disclosures, or: something, sometime…

“ISSB unanimously confirms Scope 3 GHG emissions disclosure requirements with strong application support, among key decisions,” announced a recent press release. Here’s what it said: A few days later the formal meeting summary set out some of the possibilities discussed for providing support: The press release indicated that the ISSB already possesses a certain flair…

Sustainability-related disclosures – make the connections!

As we’ve addressed many times, the International Sustainability Standards Board issued its first two exposure drafts, General Sustainability-related Disclosures (S1) and Climate-related Disclosures (S2), which were both open for comment until July 29, 2022. Here’s an extract from the S1 document: It’s hard to imagine many people disagreeing with the basic premise and asserting that…

IFRS – part of the neoliberal myth?

Globalism Failed to Deliver the Economy We Need heralds a recent article in The New York Times. It’s written by Rana Foroohar. Here are some extracts: The article concludes: “One of the most persistent neoliberal myths was that the world was flat and national interests would play second fiddle to global markets. The past several…

Festival of errors!

Let’s look at another extract from the Ontario Securities Commission’s refilings and errors list. You’ll recall that this is a record of companies that refiled or restated some aspect of their continuous disclosure record as a result of an OSC review – the list has the dual purpose, I believe, of providing an extra degree…

Targeting the auditors, or: too short on confidence!

Here’s the main text of a recent news release issued by the Ontario Securities Commission: The news release received what was presumably the intended press coverage, with the Globe and Mail noting that while the release didn’t name any names, “Canadian or U.S. affiliates of three of the Big Four global firms – Deloitte LLP,…

Contractual cash flow characteristics – too much exposure!

The IASB recently discussed some potential amendments to the contractual cash flow characteristics requirements in IFRS 9 Financial Instruments. We’ve already addressed some potential amendments to clarify some of the underlying principles of the solely payments of principal and interest (‘SPPI’) assessment. You’ll recall that IFRS 9 is based on the premise that amortized cost…

Sustainability-related disclosures – fine, but not too often!

As we addressed here, the International Sustainability Standards Board has issued its first two exposure drafts, General Sustainability-related Disclosures (S1) and Climate-related Disclosures (S2), which were both open for comment until July 29, 2022. The general exposure draft proposes that an entity be required to report its sustainability-related financial disclosures at the same time as…

Contractual cash flow characteristics – resist that variability!

The IASB recently discussed some potential amendments to the contractual cash flow characteristics requirements in IFRS 9 Financial Instruments. The purpose of these would be to clarify some of the underlying principles of the “solely payments of principal and interest” (‘SPPI’) assessment. Feedback from the post-implementation review of IFRS 9 had indicated “that the IASB…

21st century challenges in sustainability, or: long to reign over us!

One of CPA Canada’s less adroit recent moments was as follows: The first part of the message is just conventional platitude, but still of a kind that a rational, forward-looking Canadian organization should have been able to avoid. The second part is rather more damagingly revealing. A4S, its website reminds us, “was established by HM…