Is IFRS 9 better than IAS 39 for investors’ decisions? Evidence from the European context at the beginning of the transition year

The first-time adoption of International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) 9 at the beginning of fiscal year 2018 has offered the opportunity to test whether the information provided by this new accounting standard on financial instruments is more useful for investors than International Accounting Standard (IAS) 39. This pa- per assesses and compares the value relevance of book value calculated according to the requirements of the two accounting standards on financial instruments at the beginning of the transition year for a sample of 110 financial entities listed in 20 stock markets that have recorded transition effects between retained earnings. Find- ings provide evidence that both IAS 39 and IFRS 9 are value relevant and that the second one adds more information than that previously supplied by the first one. The paper contributes to the literature by providing the first evidence of the usefulness of the new accounting standard on financial instruments. About its practical impli- cations, the paper provides insights regarding the high quality of the International Accounting Standard Board (IASB)’s standard setting process.

Keywords: IFRS 9, IAS 39, value relevance, European Union, financial entities.