The Transparency Directive: periodic reporting requirements
The Financial Services Authority's (FSA) new rules implementing the Transparency Directive (TD) apply for accounting periods beginning on or after 20 January 2007. These final rules (Disclosure Rules and Transparency Rules, referred to as DTR) which include requirements relating to the provision of periodic information are largely a copy of the TD requirements as expressed in the original EU Directive.
The FSA issued a special edition of their newsletter List! in December 2006 (issue 14) dedicated to the TD, which was updated in April 2007. Whilst the TD edition of List! represents 'informal views of the FSA and does not constitute formal FSA guidance', it does provide a good indication of how the FSA expects the rules to work in practice. As stated in the newsletter, the FSA 'supports a market-let solution' where the detail of periodic financial information, such as interim management statements (IMS) 'are developed by market practitioners and discussed between preparers and users of the information.' Accordingly, prior to the emergence of accepted good practice, formal guidance for companies is limited.
Our objective with this publication is to provide additional guidance for entities required to implement the new DTR rules, focusing on the periodic reporting requirements of the DTR. In particular the publication addresses key questions such as:
- What are the new reporting deadlines?
- What are the requirements relating to 'quarterly reporting'?
- What content might be contained in a typical 'quarterly report'?
- How can directors address the requirements to provide responsibility statements?
- What should the narrative report accompanying the half-yearly financial statements contain?
