While 99% of listed firms report consolidated financial statements in developed countries such as U.S. and England, only about half of listed firms in Korea prepare for consolidated financial statements at present. The International Financial Reporting Standards(IFRS) require consolidated financial statements as the main financial statements. Thus, unless the number of firms reporting consolidated financial statements significantly increases following the adoption of the IFRS in year 2011, it would be difficult for consolidated financial statements to maintain the status of the main financial statements in our country.
 

Under the current accounting standards in Korea, a parent company should consolidate an investee company so long as its ownership exceeds 30%, when it is the major shareholder. In addition, the Korean accounting standards allow for exempting subsidiaries from consolidation, which are established for special purpose, ie, SPC, or small in firm size, ie, less than 10 billion Korean Won in total assets. However, the so-called principle-based IFRS not only sticks to the theoretical 50% ownership rule, but does not allow for any exclusions of subsidiaries in consolidation. Thus two major changes are expected following the adoption of the IFRS in Korea. First, the scope of consolidation could be shrunk significantly, particularly for large business group firms, as their associated companies between 30% and 50% of ownership become ineligible for consolidation under the IFRS. Second, the number of firms reporting consolidated financial statements would substantially increase as there would be many new firms starting to consolidate their SPCs or subsidiaries with total assets less than 10 billion Korean Won under the IFRS. The purpose of this study is to investigate these two aspects empirically. This study expects to aid governmental supervisory agencies to set policies and regulations regarding consolidated financial statements, and to help related companies and information users to prepare in advance for the effect of IFRS adoption on consolidated financial statements.

The results show that the adoption of IFRS in Korea in year 2011 would indeed have an effect to substantially reduce the size of consolidated entity particularly for large business group firms as their several associated companies with large asset bases and sales revenues are deleted under the 50% ownership rule for consolidation. The financial performance of consolidated entity appears to be worsened also for those large firms as profitable associated companies with high operating income are dropped from consolidation. The other results tell that our IFRS adoption would increase the number of firms preparing for consolidated financial statements substantially from the current 53.6% to 86.7% among all the listed firms.

The adoption of IFRS would accelerate our efforts to enhance consolidated financial statements as the main financial statements in accordance with global standards. Some concerns are that IFRS adoption could instantaneously increase the number of firms preparing for consolidated financial statements too much, and, for existing preparers, could have huge impact on the content of consolidated financial statements at one time. Governmental supervisory agencies and related companies need to take proper actions in anticipation of these drastic changes. In particular, governmental supervisory agencies should be keen to make appropriate revisions in time to regulations based on financial statement numbers such as debt ratio, total assets, and sales revenue as there will be big changes in the main financial statements following the imminent IFRS adoption.