Unwieldy Rules Useless for Investors [Extract]

Millions of dollars have been spent adopting IFRS to help investors make like-for-like comparisons between companies in global capital markets. But CFOs say they are useless and have driven financial disclosures to unmanageable levels. The criticism comes as the United States, the world's largest capital market, decides whether to retire its domestic accounting standard (US GAAP) and adopt IFRS. "In seven years I never got one question from fund managers or investment analysts about IFRS adjustments," former AXA head of finance Geoff Roberts said. "Investors . . . rely on investor reports and management briefings to understand companies' numbers." If analysts did delve into IFRS accounts, they would most probably misinterpret them, according to Wesfarmers finance director Terry Bowen. "Once you get into the notes you have to be technically trained. If you're not, lot of it could be misleading," Mr. Bowen said. Commonwealth Bank chief financial officer David Craig said IFRS numbers were disregarded by investors because they could actually obscure an institution's true position.

Questions

a) Refer to the opinions in the quoted comments above and discuss the qualitative characteristics [released by the Conceptual Framework for Financial Reporting] that have not been satisfied under IFRS.

b) Specifically, examine the views given above on financial reporting and explain whether it will satisfy the objective of financial reporting under the Conceptual Framework for Financial Reporting.