A Study of the Adoption and Implementation of International Financial Reporting Standards in the Two EU Countries of Denmark and Ireland and New Zealand, a Non EU Country

The International Accounting Standards Board has as its mission the development of a singlet set of high quality standards to be applied consistently by companies globally. The purpose of this paper is to examine the implementation process to integrate IFRS in the smaller and developed countries of Denmark, Ireland and New Zealand. The paper examines the enablers for successful IFRS implementation, namely, Legislative changes, Accounting profession, Stock exchanges, Enforcement, Early adopters in 2004, and Adopters in 2005. An examination of the top 30 companies’ annual reports for the three countries was made to test for voluntary compliance of IFRS in 2004 and mandatory compliance in 2005. The results show that Denmark is the only country with early adopters in 2004. All 30 Danish companies complied in 2005, with 24 in Ireland, and 9 in New Zealand.