On the meaning, importance and translation of ‘realised’

Non-governmental standard-setters need to establish legitimacy by, among other things, demonstrating expertise. Therefore, the IASB aims to use clearly articulated principles and consistent concepts. This paper makes a comprehensive examination of the concept of ‘realised’ in IFRS. The term appears extensively but is not defined. It seems to have a variety of meanings, technical and not. In translations of IFRS, ‘realised’ is usually rendered using cognate words (e.g. ‘réalisé’) but sometimes it is not. In some translations, the word used for ‘realised’ appears far more often than in the original IFRS. In some jurisdictions (such as the UK) where IFRS is used for reporting by individual legal entities, ‘realised’ establishes the legal limit on dividend payments, but its definition is not consistent with any of the implied meanings in IFRS. This paper makes suggestions about how to remove the term from IFRS in order to improve clarity.