“The new international standards try to respond to how financial information is accessed, used and consumed today”

Frederic Borràs, corresponding academician of the Royal European Academy of Doctors-Barcelona 1914 (RAED) and member of the Forum of Firms, a body associated with the International Federation of Auditors (IFAC) that brings together the 27 most important audit societies in the world, ensures that the new international auditing standards that will begin to be implemented from next year will substantially modify the mechanisms of the markets. “The new international accounting standards (IFRS) represent a great paradigm shift to try to respond to the different way in which financial information is accessed, used and consumed in our days, improving and adapting the information that companies offer to current needs”.

Dr. Frederic Borràs Pàmies - The new auditing standards

Dr. Frederic Borràs Pàmies

Borràs participated between October 17 and 19 in the meeting that the Forum of Firms held annually in New York on behalf of IECnet, a company to which Morera Asesores & Auditores belongs. The academician is a member of its Board of Directors and its global auditor. The meeting discussed the deployment of this set of standards promoted by the IFAC. The first, starting in 2018, will be the new model for presenting information related to financial instruments and incomes. In 2019 the new presentation on leases will begin to be followed and, in 2021, the insurance contracts.

“The main objective is to improve the form and content of basic financial statements, such as the balance sheet or incomes statement, so that they better reflect what companies are currently and what users of financial information need to know about them. The current financial statements were designed at the time that we could call industrial, when the main assets were physical, currently the predominant values ​​are immaterial”, explains Borràs in an article published by the Spanish newspaper Expansión.

The academician also advances a future international system for classifying the concepts of auditing and financial information that will expedite the consultation on any international society hosted by the new model. “We are also working on what is called IFRS Taxonomy, a project to facilitate financial information in electronic format, this format will involve a classification system of its elements that allows structuring to make it easier to access and understand”, he explains. Morera Asesores & Auditores is the auditor of the RAED.