Strategic Business Reporting (SBR)

Introduction to Strategic Business Reporting

The Strategic Business Reporting (SBR) exam requires you to demonstrate your ability to make strategic business reporting decisions. Building on your existing knowledge and skills, in SBR you will need to link accounting issues to relevant concepts in practical situations. You will need to demonstrate judgement and often consider the perspective of different stakeholders such as investors in your answers.

As well as demonstrating a sound understanding of the specific technical knowledge relating to group financial statements you will also need to exercise professional and ethical judgement.

How to approach the Strategic Business Reporting (SBR) exam

SBR has a wide ranging syllabus, which includes many accounting standards, some introduced in Financial Reporting and others examined only in SBR. Current issues, exposure drafts and narrative reporting frameworks also feature. Questions are set in the context of single entities, groups, private or public sector, for-profit, or not-for-profit organisations.
To study SBR effectively you need to understand the nature of the exam and what you will be asked to do.

Main capabilities

On successful completion of this paper, candidates should be able to:

•  Apply fundamental ethical and professional principles to ethical dilemmas and discuss the consequences of unethical behaviour
• Evaluate the appropriateness of the financial reporting framework and critically discuss changes in accounting regulation
• Apply professional judgement in the reporting of the financial performance of a range of entities
  NOTE the learning outcomes in Section C of the syllabus can apply to: single entities, groups, public sector entities and not-for profit entities (where appropriate)
• Prepare the financial statements of groups of entities
• Interpret financial statements for different stakeholders
• Communicate the impact of changes and potential changes in accounting regulation on financial reporting