국제회계기준위원회(IASB)가 제정하는 국제재무보고기준(IFRS)이 글로벌 스탠더드로 정착하는 추세에 있다. 이에 우리나라에서도 IFRS 도입을 위한 로드맵을 2007년 3월 발표하였다. 로드맵에 따르면 2009년부터 적용희망기업을 대상으로 K-IFRS를 선택적용하고 2011년에는 모든 상장기업을 대상으로 의무 적용하되 비상장기업에 대해서는 회계처리방법이 간명한 회계처리기준을 제정하여 적용할 예정이다. 본 연구는 비상장기업 회계기준제정 방향을 설정하기 위한 단초를 마련하기 위하여 실시되었다. 비상장 회계기준은 비상장기업의 회계처리 부담을 완화하기 위하여 K-IFRS에서 정한 사항과 다르게 적용할 수 있는 회계처리기준을 제정하는 것이다. 따라서 비상장 회계기준은 기본적으로 K-IFRS보다 완화된 형태를 취해야 한다. 현행 기준서체계 하에서 K-GAAP에 비해 완화된 회계처리기준인 중소기업회계처리특례의 이용실태를 면밀히 분석하여 보면 앞으로 제정하여야 하는 비상장기준서에 대한 지침을 찾을 수 있을 것으로 생각된다. 따라서 600개 기업을 임의로 선정하여 중소기업특례 이용실태에 대한 분석을 실시하였으며 주요 분석결과는 다음과 같다. 기준서 제14호에 중소기업 회계처리 특례가 12개 열거되어 있다 하더라도 57.3%에 해당하는 중소기업들은 1개내지 2개정도의 특례기준만을 적용하고 있음을 알 수 있었다. 특히 22.0%에 해당하는 기업들은 특례기준을 전혀 적용하지 않고 있다. 그리고 기업의 규모가 클수록 특례기준을 적용하지 않는 기업이 많았다. 또한 Big4가 감사하는 기업일수록 특례기준을 적용하지 않는 기업이 많았다. 구체적으로 중소기업특례 적용대상기업들 중 5%이상이 사용하는 특례규정은 지분증권 취득원가평가, 지분법적용배제, 장기채권⋅채무 명목가액 평가, 내용연수 법인세법규정적용, 이연법인세 적용 배제, 주당순이익 기재 생략, 사업부문별정보 기재 생략의 7개이며 이중 2개는 주기 혹은 주석에 관련된 항목이다. 즉 현행 기준서 제14호의 중소기업 특례규정 적용사례 분석결과 이연법인세, 주당순이익, 현재가치평가 등의 일부조항 외에는 대체로 적용되지 않고 있다는 것을 알 수 있었다. 이러한 경향은 추후 비상장기준서를 제정함에 있어 다음과 같은 시사점이 있다. 비상장기업의 경우 현행 중소기업 회계처리특례규정을 적용받는 기업에 비하여 적용기업의 범위가 넓고 규모가 큰 기업이 포함되어 있다. 따라서 비상장기준서를 일반 비상장기업과 중소기업으로 나누어 적용범위를 달리할 필요가 있다. 또한 현행 중소기업기준은 상시근로자수, 자본금, 또는 매출액을 기준으로 중소기업을 구분하고 있을 뿐 아니라 산업별로 구분기준이 달라 일반이용자는 특정 기업이 중소기업인지 여부를 판단하는데 어려움이 많다. 모든 이용자들이 손쉽게 구분할 수 있도록 회계적의미가 명확한 직전연도 자산규모(예: 500억미만) 등에 따라 구분하는 것이 이용자측면을 고려한 현실적인 대안이다. 상장기업에 대해 2011년부터 K-IFRS를 전면 적용함과 동일한 맥락에서 비상장기업에 대해서도 K-IFRS(SME)를 도입하는 것이 국제회계기준과 국내회계기준의 완전한 정합을 지향하는 방향이다. 그러나 이 경우 국내 비상장기업의 재무제표 작성비용이 크게 증가할 전망이다. 따라서 상장기업에 대해서는 K-IFRS를 적용하고 비상장기업에 대해서는 현행과 같이 기존의 K-GAAP을 사용하되 중소기업에 대해서 현재와 같이 특례규정을 존치시켜 차별화하는 것이 바람직하다고 생각된다. 요약하면 상장법인들은 K-IFRS를 적용하고 나머지 회사들을 기업자산규모로 구분하여 규모가 큰 기업에 대하여는 비상장기준서를 채택하고 규모가 작은 기업에 대하여는 회계처리 특례를 인정하는 방안이 바람직하다고 생각한다.

Recently, International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), established by International Accounting Standards Board (IASB), is being world-widely settled down as a global standard. As the demand for an internationally unified accounting standard increases, most countries around the world tend to adopt IFRS as their accounting standard. Influenced by these global changes, Korea Accounting Standards Board held a public hearing in November, 2006 and officially announced a road map. According to the road map, K-IFRS will be optionally applied to companies that wish to adopt it from 2009, but it will be obligatorily applied to every listed company by 2011. The road map presents that accounting standards that are simpler than K-IFRS and current accounting standards will be established and applied to unlisted companies until K-IFRS is applied. The present study aims to provide a ground work for establishing Korea’s accounting standards of unlisted companies. The followings are the major results of the study: Even though twelve exemptions made for SME accounting management are listed, 57.3% of the companies were found to apply only one or two exemption standards. Furthermore, it was also shown that 22% of the enterprises did not apply any exemption standard. The bigger companies were, the less they applied exemption standards. This tendency provides an implication for establishing accounting standards for unlisted companies in the future: Unlisted companies include a wider range of and larger companies than companies applied by accounting exemptions for unlisted companies. Therefore, accounting standards for unlisted companies should be divided into unlisted companies and SME and should differ in their application range. According to current SME laws, since subsidiaries of major companies are excluded from SME range, there is no big problem in preparing parent companies’ consolidated financial statements. However, since applying accounting standards for unlisted companies becomes a burden to unlisted companies, which have their parent companies as listed companies, it is desirable that accounting standards for unlisted companies be similar to K-IFRS. There is a huge difference of the frequency of applying exemptions based on the asset. Since current SME standards not only classify minor enterprises based on the number of full-time laborers, capital, or sales but also have different classification standard by industry, customers face difficulties to figure out which particular companies are SME. Therefore, classifying companies based on the previous year’s assets that have clear accounting meaning (ex: less than 50 billion Korean Won) is a reasonable alternative plan which considers customers’ side. The regulation of exemptions that 5% of the companies targeted for SME exemptions application use is equity recorded as historical cost, exemption of equity method, book value of long- term receivable and debt, useful life under tax law, exemption of deferred tax, exemption of EPS, exemption of segment reporting, and two of these are related to the footnote or note. Since big sized companies normally have a strong possibility to have unmarketable investments of equities, they apply exemptions and evaluate unmarketable investments of equities recorded as historical costs. Exemption regulations that do not apply equity methods on equities that can have tremendous influence also had more cases applying exemptions on big-sized SME as mentioned above. An exemption regulation that says receivable and debt which occurs when long-term installment payment and long-term lending and borrowing happen is being used by 70 companies out of 600 sample companies, which takes 11.7% of the usage frequency. SME which is as large as equity regulations tends to frequently use exemption regulations, but the difference is not notable. Looking at the frequency of applying SME accounting exemptions based on the size of companies, smaller the business is, more possibility in using exemption regulations. In addition, the study analyzes the difference in companies’ frequency of exemptions applied based on auditors. In the case that auditors are local accounting firms or personal auditor groups, there is more possibility to use exemption regulations. This shows that whether companies apply exemptions or not can be affected by auditors. This fact shows that if K-IFRS is introduced or the content of accounting standards for unlisted companies is similarly established with K-IFRS, auditors must be educated. In conclusion, as a result of analysis of the cases applying the 14th SME exemption regulation, exemption regulations except deferred income tax, EPS, fair value and other articles are not generally being applied. Since the time for IASB to establish and operate SME IFRS became imminent, there is a need to carefully observe not only transformation of general IFRS to K-IFRS but also SME IFRS. By applying K-IFRS to listed companies from 2011 and applying K-IFRS(SME) to unlisted companies, the international accounting standards and the local accounting standards are being aimed to be unified. However, in this case, the cost to prepare local unlisted companies’ financial statements will highly increase. Therefore, it is reasonable to keep listed companies and unlisted companies distinct by applying K-IFRS to listed companies and keeping exemption regulations about K-GAAP for unlisted companies. In this case, there may be argument about local listed companies’ accounting credential level. Also, unlisted companies may have the burden to prepare financial statements twice when they are listed and they need to make fund through International Financial Market. There is a need to make a balance between the cost and the gains resulted from establishing accounting standards for unlisted companies. When IFRS is applied to unlisted SME, the local accounting’s credential level will be dramatically raised. On the other hand, the expected cost will rise as the cost of preparing unlisted companies’ financial statements and the cost of the inspection rise. Therefore, it is necessary to look for the ways to maximize the net profit of long-term system change. Lastly, for the plan for the accounting standard system, four following options exist. The first option is to apply K-IFRS bounded within listed companies and adopt a sole accounting standard for unlisted companies for other companies for other companies. The second option is to apply K-IFRS bounded within listed companies and adopt a sole accounting standard for unlisted companies for other companies.

Recently, International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), established by International Accounting Standards Board (IASB), is being world-widely settled down as a global standard. As the demand for an internationally unified accounting standard increases, most countries around the world tend to adopt IFRS as their accounting standard. Influenced by these global changes, Korea Accounting Standards Board held a public hearing in November, 2006 and officially announced a road map. According to the road map, K-IFRS will be optionally applied to companies that wish to adopt it from 2009, but it will be obligatorily applied to every listed company by 2011. The road map presents that accounting standards that are simpler than K-IFRS and current accounting standards will be established and applied to unlisted companies until K-IFRS is applied. The present study aims to provide a ground work for establishing Korea’s accounting standards of unlisted companies. The followings are the major results of the study: Even though twelve exemptions made for SME accounting management are listed, 57.3% of the companies were found to apply only one or two exemption standards. Furthermore, it was also shown that 22% of the enterprises did not apply any exemption standard. The bigger companies were, the less they applied exemption standards. This tendency provides an implication for establishing accounting standards for unlisted companies in the future: Unlisted companies include a wider range of and larger companies than companies applied by accounting exemptions for unlisted companies. Therefore, accounting standards for unlisted companies should be divided into unlisted companies and SME and should differ in their application range. According to current SME laws, since subsidiaries of major companies are excluded from SME range, there is no big problem in preparing parent companies’ consolidated financial statements. However, since applying accounting standards for unlisted companies becomes a burden to unlisted companies, which have their parent companies as listed companies, it is desirable that accounting standards for unlisted companies be similar to K-IFRS. There is a huge difference of the frequency of applying exemptions based on the asset. Since current SME standards not only classify minor enterprises based on the number of full-time laborers, capital, or sales but also have different classification standard by industry, customers face difficulties to figure out which particular companies are SME. Therefore, classifying companies based on the previous year’s assets that have clear accounting meaning (ex: less than 50 billion Korean Won) is a reasonable alternative plan which considers customers’ side. The regulation of exemptions that 5% of the companies targeted for SME exemptions application use is equity recorded as historical cost, exemption of equity method, book value of long- term receivable and debt, useful life under tax law, exemption of deferred tax, exemption of EPS, exemption of segment reporting, and two of these are related to the footnote or note. Since big sized companies normally have a strong possibility to have unmarketable investments of equities, they apply exemptions and evaluate unmarketable investments of equities recorded as historical costs. Exemption regulations that do not apply equity methods on equities that can have tremendous influence also had more cases applying exemptions on big-sized SME as mentioned above. An exemption regulation that says receivable and debt which occurs when long-term installment payment and long-term lending and borrowing happen is being used by 70 companies out of 600 sample companies, which takes 11.7% of the usage frequency. SME which is as large as equity regulations tends to frequently use exemption regulations, but the difference is not notable. Looking at the frequency of applying SME accounting exemptions based on the size of companies, smaller the business is, more possibility in using exemption regulations. In addition, the study analyzes the difference in companies’ frequency of exemptions applied based on auditors. In the case that auditors are local accounting firms or personal auditor groups, there is more possibility to use exemption regulations. This shows that whether companies apply exemptions or not can be affected by auditors. This fact shows that if K-IFRS is introduced or the content of accounting standards for unlisted companies is similarly established with K-IFRS, auditors must be educated. In conclusion, as a result of analysis of the cases applying the 14th SME exemption regulation, exemption regulations except deferred income tax, EPS, fair value and other articles are not generally being applied. Since the time for IASB to establish and operate SME IFRS became imminent, there is a need to carefully observe not only transformation of general IFRS to K-IFRS but also SME IFRS. By applying K-IFRS to listed companies from 2011 and applying K-IFRS(SME) to unlisted companies, the international accounting standards and the local accounting standards are being aimed to be unified. However, in this case, the cost to prepare local unlisted companies’ financial statements will highly increase. Therefore, it is reasonable to keep listed companies and unlisted companies distinct by applying K-IFRS to listed companies and keeping exemption regulations about K-GAAP for unlisted companies. In this case, there may be argument about local listed companies’ accounting credential level. Also, unlisted companies may have the burden to prepare financial statements twice when they are listed and they need to make fund through International Financial Market. There is a need to make a balance between the cost and the gains resulted from establishing accounting standards for unlisted companies. When IFRS is applied to unlisted SME, the local accounting’s credential level will be dramatically raised. On the other hand, the expected cost will rise as the cost of preparing unlisted companies’ financial statements and the cost of the inspection rise. Therefore, it is necessary to look for the ways to maximize the net profit of long-term system change. Lastly, for the plan for the accounting standard system, four following options exist. The first option is to apply K-IFRS bounded within listed companies and adopt a sole accounting standard for unlisted companies for other companies for other companies. The second option is to apply K-IFRS bounded within listed companies and adopt a sole accounting standard for unlisted companies for other companies.

International Financial Reporting Standards(IFRS), SME IFRS, K- IFRS, K-GAAP, Korea’s Accounting Standards for Unlisted Companies