The IFRS Foundation has published an updated version of its analysis showing how the International Financial Reporting Standards have been adopted in 140 countries. The 'snapshot' assesses the progress of IFRS as the global standard for financial reporting.

The report says: “The vision of global accounting standards is shared by almost every country in the world. Today, more than 100 countries require the use of IFRS by public companies, while most other jurisdictions permit the use of IFRS in at least some circumstances. We are not yet at the point at which IFRS adoption is total and complete. But if you consider that just 15 years ago very few jurisdictions even permitted IFRS, we have come a very long way in a short period of time.”

The IFRS Foundation intends to publish IFRS profiles for each country, stating the jurisdiction's use of IFRS. Currently, profiles are completed for the G20 jurisdictions plus 120 other countries. The profiles may be found here: http://go.ifrs.org/global-standards. 

Of the 140 jurisdictions whose profiles have been posted: 

• 116 jurisdictions (83 per cent of the profiles) require IFRS for all or most domestic publicly accountable entities (listed companies and financial institutions). 
• most of the remaining 24 jurisdictions that do not yet require IFRS for all or most domestic publicly accountable entities already permit it for at least some of those entities. 

The IFRS report also made the following observations:

• nearly all jurisdictions have publicly stated a commitment in support of global accounting standards. In fact, 130 of the 140 countries have stated a commitment. Of those that have not stated a public commitment to IFRS (Albania, Belize, Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Egypt, Macao, Paraguay, Suriname, Switzerland and Vietnam), at least some public entities in many of the 10 jurisdictions are already using the global standards. 
• The relevant authority in 132 of the 140 jurisdictions has publicly stated that IFRS should be the global accounting standards. The only countries where this has not been the case are: Belize, Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Egypt, Macao, Suriname, Switzerland and Vietnam. 
• Around 60 per cent of the 116 jurisdictions that require IFRS for domestic listed companies also require IFRS for unlisted financial institutions and/or large unlisted companies. 
• The 140 jurisdictions have made very few modifications to IFRS, and the few that were made are generally regarded as temporary steps in the jurisdiction’s plans to adopt IFRS. 
• Some of the 24 jurisdictions that do not yet require IFRS for all or most domestic listed companies include: China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Switzerland and the US.
• Seventy-three of the 140 jurisdictions require or permit IFRS for SMEs. Another 14 are actively considering it.