Nicolas Verón: Governance of international accounting standard-setting

03 March 2011

Verón commented on the paper published by the IFRS Foundation Trustees on its strategy. He argues that experience suggests that it is impossible for accounting standard-setters to internalise all potential public policy concerns without lowering the quality of their standards.

Furthermore, as global standards, IFRS cannot possibly integrate the diversity of public policy approaches in the world’s numerous jurisdictions. Financial stability, in particular, is understood differently in different local contexts, partly as a function of political history and regimes, financial development, and attitudes to risk. Thus, financial stability concerns are a valid element to be taken into account in jurisdictional frameworks for the adoption of IFRS, such as the one that exists in the European Union. But they should not be referred to as part of the Foundation’s own mandate.

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