This paper explores whether mandatory disclosure of bank balance sheet information can improve welfare. In our benchmark model, mandatory disclosure can raise welfare only when markets are frozen, i.e. when investors refuse to fund banks in the absence of balance sheet information. Even then,...

As of October 2008, the new amendments to IAS 39 & IFRS 7 were introduced by IASB as a direct reaction to the financial crisis. Since IFRS followers was given the option to reclassify certain financial assets, it partially changes the mark-to-market requirements, and leads to the fair accounting...

Many listed companies around the world are required to prepare their consolidated accounts according to International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) since fiscal year 2005. Ulf Brüggemann discusses and empirically investigates the economic consequences of this mandatory switch to IFRS. He...