WSJ Article: Leases Suffer Identity Crisis

Yesterday's Wall Street Journal (May 22) had a sizable article produced by CFO Journal, titled "Leases Suffer Identity Crisis," reviewing the controversy over expense recognition in the new lease accounting standard. Most of what's discussed there we've already seen, though a few items are worthy of note:

• They expect the revised exposure draft to be released in "mid-2013"
• IASB Chairman Hans Hoogervorst is quoted as saying that leases “are somewhere in between a purchase and a service, so our traditional answers in accounting don’t give a simple way to do this. ... The only clear signal we have from investors is to get them on the balance sheet and to keep it as simple as possible.”

The article quotes both a preparer and an accountant as considering many of the proposals overly complex ("over-engineered") and not useful.

The Journal often doesn't make CFO Journal articles available on the web (see, for instance, the article noted in this post), but at least for now, it's available without a subscription.

Tomorrow's meeting will discuss expense recognition. I intend to listen live, and will report once it's complete.