Regulatory updates

The proposed strategy and work plan sets out the IESBA’s vision, strategic drivers and themes to guide its actions over the next strategy period of 2024-2027, as well as a number of topics the IESBA has identified as potential new work streams for the period.

While the International Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants (including International Independence Standards) has been significantly strengthened in recent years, the IESBA believes it is important to continue to evolve the Code with developments in business and the external environment to maintain its robustness and relevance, a need further emphasized by continuing corporate failures around the world that erode public trust in the accountancy profession.

Among other actions to achieve its strategic vision, the IESBA plans to devote significant efforts to expanding and strengthening its working relationships with a wide range of stakeholders. Additionally, the IESBA plans to continue to strengthen its coordination with the International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (IAASB), as well as other international and national standard setters, to enhance the Code’s interoperability with reporting and assurance standards within the financial and sustainability reporting ecosystems.

Comments are invited by 7 July 2023.

To access the text of the proposed work plan, please click here

In order to assist the professional accountants in ethically navigating the challenges and opportunities brought by various technological advances, the Australian Accounting Professional and Ethical Standards Board (APESB) and the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants (IESBA), have jointly released a publication, Applying the Code's Conceptual Framework to Independence: Practical Guidance for Auditors In Technology-related Scenarios .

The publication describes key technology-related provisions of the International Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants (including International Independence Standards) (the Code) and provides auditors with various practical examples involving technology-related non-assurance services to illustrate how to apply the Code's requirements w.r.t. independence.

To access the text of the publication, please click here

In February 2023, the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants (IESBA) issued certain revisions to the International Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants (including International Independence Standards) (the Code) relating to the definition of ‘engagement team’ and ‘group audit’. The revisions mainly dealt with the following matters:

• Strengthen and clarify the independence principles that apply to individuals and firms engaged in a group audit,
• Specify the need for appropriate communication on independence matters between the group auditor firm and component auditor firms participating in the group audit,
• Amend the definitions of the terms ‘engagement team’ and ‘audit team’ in the Code to recognise the different and evolving engagement team structures, and address the implications of those definitional changes, etc

In this regard, recently IESBA issued certain Q&As on the aforementioned revisions. The Q&As aim to explain the alignment between the changes introduced by IESBA with the corresponding revisions made by IAASB in the International Standards on Auditing (ISAs) and International Standards on Quality Management (ISQMs) and enable the relevant stakeholders in understanding the revisions to the Code.

To access the text of the Q&As, please click here

IESBA has issued its Strategic Work Plan (SWP) with an aim to be agile and encourage the Code of Ethics as an integral part of business and organisations.

The two areas of focus in the SWP for the period 2024 to 2027 are as follows:

• Firm culture and governance
• Extending the applicability of the Code of Ethics to all individuals performing the same activity.

To access the text of SWP, please click here

IESBA has issued its Strategic Work Plan (SWP) with an aim to be agile and encourage the Code of Ethics as an integral part of business and organisations.

These new standards are aimed at complementing and further strengthening the relevance of the existing IESBA Code addressing Tax Planning and Related Services. The standards become effective 1 July 2025.

To access the text of the standards, please click here

The International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants (IESBA) today released an update to its Questions and Answers (Q&As) publication, originally published in March 2023, on the IESBA revisions to the definitions of listed entity and public interest entity (PIE) in the IESBA Code of Ethics.

This update includes a new Q&A (16) to address the scenario where a jurisdiction has no PIE definition or excluded one or more of the mandatory categories in the IESBA PIE definition. In addition, Q&A 20 has been updated following the finalization of Track 1 of IAASB’s PIE project and the IAASB’s agreement to update ISA 700 (Revised) so that the auditor’s report can be used as a mechanism for firms to comply with the transparency requirement set out in the IESBA PIE revisions.

To access the text of the revision, please click here