As the Move to IFRS Accelerates, Liability Looms for Unprepared U.S. CPAs

Carl Jenkins, CPA/ABV, CFE, and Steven Wolf, CPA, CFE

The steady advance toward the acceptance of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) as the basis for U.S. financial reporting represents a fundamental change for the U.S. accounting profession. It is a switch for which the U.S. is ill-prepared on many levels. One area that has not received enough attention is that of legal liability. During the transition to or the initial adoption of IFRS, U.S. courts could be flooded with liability claims questioning whether accounting standards can be relied upon and whether accountants are competent to prepare financial statements.