The efforts of the IASB to change lease accounting have
stretched over a number of years. Their 2010 exposure draft
received considerable criticism and since then a great deal of work
has been done to refine the detail of how a new model might work,
while keeping the overarching principle of having all leases
included on the balance sheet. In May the IASB and the US Financial
Accounting Standards Board (FASB) published an exposure draft of
their revised proposals.
The fundamental principle of bringing what are currently
classified as operating leases onto the balance sheet remains. The
key changes in the new exposure draft are as follows:
- a lessee will not be required to recognise assets and
liabilities for leases with a maximum lease term of no more than 12
months
