Effects of the new revenue recognition policy IFRS 15 for multinational Retail companies

Research Paper (postgraduate) from the year 2021 in the subject Business economics - Accounting and Taxes, grade: 88%, Manchester Metropolitan University Business School, course: Corporate Reporting, language: English, abstract: The International Financial Reporting Standard 15 (IFRS 15) - Revenue from Contracts with Customers, announced in May 2014 by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) and Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), has widely changed the way how companies recognise, measure and disclose revenues. This article investigates the question of whether the objectives to eliminate inconsistencies, improve comparability and increase revenue levels were achieved in practice. The aim is to synthesize previous research on the various effects of the IFRS 15 implementation, specifically the accounting and information effects, and provide empirical evidence for the impact on financial statements. As available literature has identified the effects for the Retail sector only superficially without any quantification, this article aims to bridge current knowledge gaps by focusing on Retail companies. To carry out this research, the author has selected four multinational Retail companies to review qualitative and quantitative information on the IFRS 15 implementation from their annual reports to determine possible accounting and information effects. Results show that IFRS 15 had no significant but slightly positive impact on the financial figures of the selected companies, leading to the conclusion that the persued goal to improve revenue levels turned effective in the Retail sector.