XBRL = X-Ray Vision for Investors

Guest post by Didem Komaromi.

Is it possible that XBRL enabled search technology increases the transparency of company financial disclosures? In my opinion, certainly it does. Whether it is publicly traded companies or privately held companies, people who are charge of management know that most investors and analysts pay more attention to information in the body of financial statements rather than lengthy footnotes and disclosures.  That’s why most of the time negative news about a company will be buried in the footnotes of a statement which is in a non-searchable format such as PDF.

The University of Washington and Indiana University provide a 38 page full research report about how XBRL will increase transparency of company financial disclosures.You can download the publication from here.

Posted by Didem Komaromi on Jul 8 2008. Filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry