Former Dutch financial regulator Hans Hoogervorst will lead the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) for five more years as the trustees from the IFRS Foundation announced his re-appointment for a second term. He is the second chair IASB has ever had, replacing outgoing chair Sir David Tweedie in 2011. Hoogervorst's second term will take place in a world much different from his first. At the time The Trusted Professional interviewed him in 2012, he was still working on the convergence project with the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), and was interested in further incorporating International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) into the U.S.

 

Today most of the major convergence standards, such as revenue recognition and leases, are getting ready to launch, representing the winding down of the convergence project. However, the U.S. consensus seems to be shifting away from IFRS: while at one time full adoption was a real possibility, in 2016 there is little support for the idea. This change in thinking was exemplified by former SEC Chair Chris Cox's being one of the biggest cheerleaders for the international standards to declaring adoption efforts in the U.S. "bereft of life" six years later. SEC Chief Accountant James Schnurr made similar comments, saying that "there is virtually no support to have the SEC mandate IFRS for all registrants."

 

Despite this, however, IFRS remains a presence in U.S. financial reporting. Foreign companies have been allowed to file IFRS statements with the SEC since 2007, and the SEC is considering supplemental use of the international standards for U.S. companies as well.