Moving to a Single GAAP Standard

An article at CFO.com highlights the sentiments of the FASB Chair to move to a single GAAP standard for both domestic and foreign companies doing business in the US.  And that standard will not be current US GAAP accounting, but rather one based on International Accounting Standards.  An excerpt from the article.

At an industry conference Friday morning, Financial Accounting Standards Board chairman Robert Herz said he expects that U.S. companies eventually will be made to follow a single accounting standard. That standard, he said, would be International Financial Reporting Standards, not U.S. generally accepted accounting principles.

Herz said he is looking for an "orderly way" to get to a single accounting system and that a national plan would be the way to go about it. The plan would consist of timetables, tasks, and education efforts to move American companies off U.S. GAAP and onto a single global standard. "I don't believe in a two-GAAP system," he said.

The FASB chairman said he objects to providing U.S. issuers with an "unfettered choice" between GAAP and IFRS because it undermines his goal of getting to a single standard. The choice may appeal to some companies, he said, but the standards are written for the benefit of investors, not companies.

For the full article, click here.