CESR consultatie gebruik alternatieve performance

CESR: consultatie gebruik alternatieve performance indicatoren

Deze conceptaanbeveling bevat verscheidene voorstellen om Europese beursgenoteerde ondernemingen te stimuleren om alternatieve  performance indicatoren op consistente en betrouwbare wijze te presenteren en toe te lichten. Alternatieve performance indicatoren kunnen  investeerders van geschikte aanvullende informatie voorzien mits aan enkele randvoorwaarden is voldaan. De conceptaanbevelingen hebben betrekking op alle financiële publicaties met uitzondering van het prospectus.

Meer informatie vind u op de website van CESR. Deze vindt u via de 'Zie ook' link.

Het originele bericht vindt u hieronder

CESR consults on recommendations on the use of alternative performance measures to ensure best practice by companies in the information prepared for investors

CESR's draft recommendation on the use of alternative performance measures (Ref. CESR/ 05-176) contains several proposals to encourage European listed companies to provide the financial markets with appropriate and useful performance measures.

At present, European listed companies use widely differing alternative performance measures. Alternative performance measures can best be described as financial data which is not extracted or cannot be derived from the statutory audited financial statements. In some cases, this data relies on non-standardised accounting terms. Most commonly, alternative performance measures are used for revenues, earnings and earnings per share (e.g. EBITDA, cash earnings, restricted earnings...). There may be other alternative measures used, such as certain balance or interest covering ratios.

The adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) in Europe will bring about the elimination of binding formats for consolidated financial statements, as set out in the 7th Accounting Directive, and as such, is likely to increase the use of alternative performance measures in the future.

Alternative performance measures can provide investors with appropriate additional information. Properly used and presented, these measures can assist investors in gaining a better understanding of a company's financial performance.

The objective of this recommendation is therefore to provide guidance on the best way to appropriately use and present alternative performance measures by establishing some clear principles that companies should consider in the preparation and disclosure of this information. Following consultation, this recommendation will be addressed to CESR members, who as securities regulators can, in turn, recommend to nationally listed companies to follow this guidance and to ensure best practice is adopted by companies. As such this should ensure that the risks of inappropriate use or, misleading use, of alternative performance measures are minimised.

The main recommendations put forward by CESR include the following:

• ­In the preparation of alternative performance measures, companies should respect the IFRS-principles for financial statements for all types of financial information, such as relevance, comparability, consistency and comprehensibility. 
• Issuers should define the terminology used in preparing alternative performance measures and set out the basis on which they have been prepared. In particular, CESR notes that disclosure is especially important if market practice or academic theory is divided about the components of that measure.
• Issuers should present alternative performance measures only in combination with defined measures. Furthermore, issuers should explain the differences between both measures, and provide investors with enough information to fully understand the results and financial position of the company.
• If the company chooses to present alternative performance measures, it should provide comparable information for other periods as well and the same performance measures should be used consistently over time. 
• Issuers tend to present alternative performance measures with remarkable prominence, sometimes even more prominently than the defined measures directly stemming from financial statements.  To ensure that investors are aware of the defined measures, CESR recommends that issuers present defined performance measures with greater prominence than alternative performance measures.
• Issuers may internally use alternative performance measures for measuring and controlling the company's output. Generally issuers explain this as the reason for presenting alternative performance measures to investors. CESR therefore recommends that issuers give an explanation of the internal use of alternative performance measures in order to make investors understand the relevance of this information.
• Finally, to ensure the information is reliable, comparable and consistent, CESR recommends that the management of the company considers involving the auditor in relation to the preparation and presentation of alternative performance measures.

CESR welcomes comments from all interested parties on the draft advice by 11 July 2005. These responses can be submitted online via CESR's website under the section 'consultations'. An open hearing will be held at CESR's headquarters in Paris (and the date once confirmed will be visible on CESR's website under 'hearings').