Title: Have IFRS made the accounting more efficient for investors? – A study of goodwill-relevance 

Level: Final assignment for Degree of Master (One Year)

Author: Patrik Nygard and Andreas Pettersson       

Supervisor: Markku Penttinen            

Date: 2010 – May

Aim: The Swedish banks SEB and Swedbank are on the same market but their goodwill is amortized totally differently and its results will be different. We decided to examine the accounts in Sweden and see if they have been more efficient, from a user perspective, after the introduction of IFRS in year 2005

Method:  This paper is made from a quantitative and a deductive approach. We have collected data from all companies listed on the Stockholm Stock Exchange between the years 2002-2008 using the computer program Financial Datastream and then made the regression and other analyses and comparisons with the program Minitab

Result & Conclusions: We have in this paper demonstrated that how the accounting of goodwill designed is relevant to investors and that this relevance has increased in Sweden after the transition to IFRS. We have also concluded that the goodwill has greater relevance in a rising market than in a downward.

Suggestions for future research: In future researches can the aim be to compare other accounting standards changes that occurred in the year 2005 and see if the accounting, from that perspective been more efficient.

Contribution of the thesis: We have shown how the account influences investor’s decisions during different accounting systems and in particular how they react on the changed account of goodwill. We have examined this on the Swedish market and because of that our results are particularly interesting for anyone that invests in Swedish stocks.