Usefulness of financial statements – practical aspects
Aspekty praktyczne użyteczności sprawozdań finansowych

Summary/Abstract: The paper presents the practical aspects of using financial statements as a trustworthy and transparent source of information for all users of financial statements, including investors and banks. In business practice, usefulness of financial statements depends primarily on two factors: adequacy of financial information presented in the statements from end users’ point of view and comparability of the statements in the vertical view (subsequent periods) as well as in the horizontal view (between entities in specific industry). Comparability of financial statements is the one of the aims of the Conceptual Framework, but it is still difficult to be achieved, among others because of leeway given by IAS/IFRS. The example of that is the IAS and IFRS proposal allowing more than one method of balance sheet elements valuation based on the fair value concept. Moreover they are not consistent in the case of business transactions recognition in financial statements, allow various interpretations of the same financial event and seem to be too complex and complicated for the end user. The paper elaborates the results of a survey executed in 2014 among participants of WIG40 and Catalyst index confirming serious difficulties in applying IAS/IFRS. Despite the International Accounting Standards Board’s efforts to promote fair value in financial statements, it is still hard to ensure high quality of financial information.

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