Research On XBRL-based IFR And Its Application In China

With the rapid development of information technology, the socio-economic environment which enterprises depend on has undergone tremendous changes. The traditional financial reporting model has been unable to meet the users' needs, so the requirement to reform has become increasingly strong. The Internet Financial Reporting (IFR) developed with the network technology is increasingly favored by the users, and it becomes a trend of financial reporting. However, there are many deficiencies with the existing IFR. Because it is tedious to exchange data, time-consuming to generate report and difficult to analyze and mine data. So, information users are still unable to truly enjoy the benefits from the new technology. The extensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) developed with XML has brought good news for the development of IFR.The normative method and descriptive method are used in this paper. Firstly, the paper commences from the evolution of financial reporting model. Then it analyzes the inevitability of the transformation of financial reporting model. And then it discusses the necessity and feasibility of the application of XBRL-based IFR and carries on a research to the technical composing and the operational principle of XBRL. At last, it analyzes XBRL's application in China and comes up some policies to advance its application. The objective of this paper is to point out the XBRL's study and its application at present and to provide some reference ideas for the researchers and policy-making agencies.There three main innovational points in this paper. Firstly, it expands the definition of financial reporting model which should include the objective of financial reporting, the channels to disseminate and the forms to disclose and use the financial reporting, covering the entire financial information supply chain. Therefore, the paper discusses the evolution of the financial reporting model from three aspects, i.e. the objective of financial reporting, the ways to disclose and the forms to use financial reporting. Secondly, the paper studies the necessity and feasibility to apply XBRL across-the-board and points out that the feasibility should include technical feasibility, economic viability, feasibility of policy, and so on. Thirdly, it emphasizes on analyzing XBRL's application in China and the existing problems in applying, and comes up some countermeasures to advance XBRL's application in China in accordance with China's actual conditions.