ESMA updates ESEF Reporting Manual
The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) has published the latest version of its ESEF Reporting Manual, expanding existing guidance and reflecting developments in the technical specifications.
The European Single Electronic Format, or ESEF, provides a unified, Inline XBRL-based approach to financial reporting across Europe, and will make data much easier to prepare, analyse and compare. Europe is currently at the steepest and most exciting part of its learning curve when it comes to ESEF reporting, with companies in many countries choosing to submit voluntarily (and some already engaged in mandatory filing) before the mandate goes Europewide next year.
The manual aims to provide guidance on commonly encountered issues in generating ESEF reports, particularly for first-time users of Inline XBRL. This update therefore builds on feedback from early implementations and clarifies ESMA’s position on emerging pitfalls, such as the issue of HTML tags inside tagged values, covered here in our series on common ESEF errors based on an analysis of our growing filings repository. For vendors, an opportunity to act fast to implement recommended solutions in their software offerings, and iron out some of these wrinkles!
