Tax Reporting for IFRS and IAS 12 Disclosures

For many corporations, the adoption of IFRS marked a significant change in tax-effect accounting practice, as well as an increase in disclosures in accounting for income taxes. International Accounting Standard (IAS) 12 deals with both current and deferred income taxes, and dictates specific disclosure standards.

This webpage aims to provide a summary of the required disclosures enumerated in IAS 12. For the purposes of this short summary, we have broken these disclosures into two groups. The first group of disclosures includes items that are standard for most group tax and treasury departments. The second group of disclosures is also required for IAS 12, but may not be necessary for all organizations, dependent on the nature of their tax situation. Our intent in providing these disclosures is not to be exhaustive; rather its aim is to enumerate the disclosures that most companies will need in their fiscal year.


Group One

  • Current and deferred tax assets and liabilities
  • Details of deferred tax assets
  • Major components of tax expense
  • Tax expense related to the statement of profit and loss
  • Reconciliation between the effective rate and the applicable rate

Group Two

  • Aggregate current and deferred taxes hitting equity
  • Effects of rate changes
  • Tax relating to discontinued operations
  • Amounts and deductible temporary differences, unused tax losses, and unused tax credits
  • Changes to unrecognized balances

The presentation, format, and detail of the tax disclosures required for IFRS typically mark a change from pre-IFRS adoption processes. ONESOURCE™ Tax Provision has been instrumental in easing the complexity of tax reporting for companies large and small at a fraction of the cost of custom solutions.

The range of problems that organizations face in being able to quickly close their books for tax reporting with the accuracy they need is often dependent on the complexity of the organization. Further, ensuring that the tax provisioning process is in synch with other financial reporting systems as well as tax filings for revenue agencies without creating redundant processes is critical. One of ONESOURCE™ Tax Provision’s strengths is its ability to automate information flows to and from current systems, and then create any adjusting tax journal entries to be booked post analysis and sign off.