Preparation, Presentation and Auditing of Financial Statements: The Trajectory of Changes

At the end of 2017, the Law of Ukraine 'On Accounting and Financial Reporting in Ukraine' was dramatically changed, and the new Law of Ukraine 'On Audit of Financial Reporting and Auditing' was adopted. The approved innovations have a Euro-integration orientation, but only partially take into account the requirements of Directive 2013/34/EU of The European Parliament and of The Council of 26 June 2013 on the annual financial statements, consolidated financial statements and related reports of certain types of undertakings. The purpose of the article is the critical analysis of legislative innovations in the field of preparation, presentation and auditing of financial statements and the formulation of proposals for their practical implementation. To achieve this purpose, methods of generalization and comparison, analysis and synthesis, and a systematic approach have been applied. The expediency of division of entities into types according to different classification features has been analyzed. The range of problems that would arise from entities that fall simultaneously into different groups of classifications is described. The essence of the concepts of financial statements, consolidated financial statements, taxonomy of financial statements, public-interest entities, and the composition of the reports submitted together with the financial statements, - Management Report, Report on Payments to governments have been explored. Approaches to drawing up the Management Report are considered. The peculiarities of preparation and auditing of financial reporting of various types of entities are revealed. The practical problems that would arise during the auditing of financial reporting are highlighted. The list of mutually agreed measures with the aim of further successful implementation of EU requirements in the national practice of accounting, reporting and auditing is proposed.