On February 10, the Securities and Exchange Commission released the final ruling that mandates companies report XBRL data. This is a pivotal moment for the financial industry. The SEC’s bold step will bring much needed transparency to the U.S. capital markets.Here’s a synopsis of the key points:
· The final rule stated that the 500 largest filers must start furnishing their financial statements in XBRL with their second quarter report for 2009. In 2010, the ruling will apply to all accelerated filers (approximately 1,800 firms) and in the following year to all public companies (approximately 12,000).
· For the first year of filing, a company will have to submit XBRL tagged data from the primary financial statements (income statement, statement of cash flows, balance sheet and shareholder’s equity) along with block tagging of footnotes. In the second year of filing, tagging of footnotes will have to be done in a detailed manner.
· The first XBRL filing a company produces can be submitted up to 30 days after their EDGAR filing. For all subsequent filings, the XBRL information must be furnished concurrently with the EDGAR document. In addition, companies must also concurrently post their XBRL filing on their own websites.
The mandate of XBRL by the SEC is as important to today’s capital markets as the 1934 Act has been to generations of investors. XBRL can help bring financial reporting into a more transparent digital age. XBRL makes data machine readable and fully traceable. XBRL is a global open standard that can handle multiple variations of language or currency. Click here to read the entire ruling.
EDGAR Online has worked diligently for years to make XBRL a reality. We were a founding member of the XBRL consortium and have made XBRL technology the backbone of our data products and services. For example, we have built the world’s only XBRL database for all U.S. public companies with fully tagged financial statements going back ten years. And we developed next generation analytical tools to enable deep analysis of the data, including I-Metrix, the award-winning online web and Excel based research product. We can also help you get ready to file XBRL tagged filings with the SEC.
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