Notes to the Company financial statements
1. Adoption of new accounting standards
New financial reporting standards (FRS) and abstracts adopted in 2009/10
During the year the Company has adopted the following amendments to FRS. None of these had a material impact on the Company’s results or assets and liabilities.
| Amendment to FRS 20 on share-based payments | Clarifies the definition of vesting conditions and the accounting treatment of cancellations. Vesting conditions are defined as either service conditions or performance conditions. Cancellations by employees are accounted for in the same way as cancellations by the Company. |
| Improvements to FRS 2008 | Contains amendments to various existing standards. |
| UITF 46 on hedges of a net investment in a foreign operation | Clarifies that a hedged risk may be designated at any level in a group and hedging instruments may be held by any company in a group (except the foreign entity being hedged), that net investment hedge accounting may not be adopted in respect of a presentation currency and that on disposal the amounts to be reclassified from equity to profit or loss are any cumulative gain or loss on the hedging instrument and the cumulative translation difference on the foreign operation disposed of. |
| Amendment to FRS 29 on improving financial instrument disclosures | Enhances disclosures about fair value and liquidity risk. |
| Amendment to FRS for Companies Act changes | Makes consequential amendments to FRS to reflect provisions of the Companies Act 2006. |
| Amendments to FRS 26 and UITF 42 on embedded derivatives | Requires reassessment of whether an embedded derivative should be separated out if a financial asset is reclassified out of the fair value through profit or loss category. |
New FRS not yet adopted
The Company has yet to adopt the following FRS, however, they are not expected to have a material impact on the Company’s results or assets and liabilities.
| Amendments to FRS 25 on puttable financial instruments and obligations arising on liquidation | Addresses the classification as a liability or as equity of certain puttable financial instruments, and instruments or components thereof, which impose upon an entity an obligation to deliver a pro rata share of net assets on liquidation. The amendments to FRS 25 have been adopted by the Company with effect from 1 April 2010. |
| Amendment to FRS 26 Financial Instruments: Recognition and measurement on eligible hedged items | Prohibits designating inflation as a hedgeable component of an instrument, unless cash flows relating to the separate inflation component are contractual and also prohibits the designation of a purchased option in its entirety as the hedge of a one-sided risk in a forecast transaction. The amendment to FRS 26 has been adopted by the Company with effect from 1 April 2010. |
| Amendment to FRS 8 on related party disclosures | Changes the definition of related party to be the same as that in law and provides an exemption only in respect of wholly-owned subsidiaries, rather than 90% subsidiaries as previously permitted. The amendment to FRS 8 has been adopted by the Company with effect from 1 April 2010. |
| FRS 30 on heritage assets | Sets out disclosure requirements in respect of assets that are held and maintained principally for their contribution to knowledge and culture. FRS 30 has been adopted by the Company with effect from 1 April 2010. |
| Amendment to FRS 20 on group cash-settled share-based payments | Clarifies the scope and accounting for group cash-settled share-based payment transactions in separate or individual financial statements when there is no obligation to settle the share-based payment transaction. The amendment to FRS 20 has been adopted by the Company with effect from 1 April 2010. |
| Improvements to FRS 2009 | Contains amendments to various existing standards. The amendments have been adopted by the Company with effect from 1 April 2010. |
| Amendment to FRS 25 on classification of rights issues | Defines as an equity instrument a financial instrument that gives the holder the right to acquire a fixed number of the entity’s equity instruments for a fixed amount of any currency, if the financial instrument is offered pro rata to all existing owners of the same class of non-derivative equity instruments. The amendment to FRS 25 has been adopted by the Company with effect from 1 April 2010. |