Digital Financial Reporting

The following is a summary of the quality measurements of XBRL-based US GAAP financial reports submitted to the SEC as of March 31, 2019.

A couple of items worth noting.  First, for the very first time a filing agent has 100% of the reports that the have submitted 100% consistent with all the fundamental accounting concept relations.  That filing agent is RDG, the software they use is Thunderdome. Honorable mention goes to DataTracks who has only 1 filing that has an error.  Second, a total of 5,063 of 5,716 or 89.1% of all XBRL-based financial reports submitted to the SEC are consistent with all of the fundamental accounting concept relations.  Only 623 are not.

Fundamental accounting concept relations continuity cross checks

The fundamental accounting concept relations continuity cross checks verifies that high-level reported information is fundamentally usable.  The following Excel spreadsheets and other documents provide details related to these quality measurements:

• Negative results from tests (i.e. confirmed errors): Details of 100% of the confirmed errors. 962 errors contained with 623 filings.
• Documentation helpful in understanding errors: Information that is helpful if you want to understand the errors.
• Best Practices for Evaluating an XBRL-based Digital Financial Reports: Explains how to evaluate an XBRL-based digital financial report.
• Overview of US GAAP Reporting Styles: Helps you understand the reporting styles used by US public companies that report using US GAAP.
• Excel base extraction tool: Allows you to extract information from about 4,060 or about 68% of all reports that use different reporting styles.  There are also several entity comparisons.
• Consistent Financial Report Core Logic: Shows financial report core logic working for 5,127 public companies. (same information in order By Assets | By Net Income (Loss) | By Net Cash Flow)
• Inconsistent Financial Report Core Logic: Shows financial report core logic NOT WORKING for 589 public companies.

FAC by Generator:

US GAAP fundamental accounting concept relations continuity cross check validation results for last 10-K or 10-Q filed by generator of the report as of March 31, 2019:

(Click image for larger view)

FAC by Test:

Same US GAAP filings as above but a summary of information by test of the reports as of March 31, 2019:

(Click image for larger view)

FAC Comparison 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019

Fundamental accounting concept relations continuity cross checks for 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019 (last 10-K or 10-Q submitted by company as of March 31):

(Click image for larger view)

The incremental improvements may seem minor now, but if you consider then nature of compounding; even small changes year-to-year can mean great leaps compounded over longer periods of time.  XBRL has only been used for about 10 years so far; XBRL is really only in its infancy.

Disclosure mechanics and reporting checklist

There was not much of a change between prior year and this year when it comes to the disclosure mechanics and reporting checklist validation checks.  On average, about 89% of disclosures were consistent with expectation.

Disclosure mechanics and reporting checklist results by generator:

(Click image for larger view)

Disclosure mechanics and reporting checklist results by disclosure:

(Click image for larger view)

Summary of Analysis of Disclosures 

Analysis of 6751 Public Company 10-Ks

**********************PRIOR RESULTS**********************

Previous fundamental accounting concept relations consistency results reported: December 31, 2018; September 30, 2018; June 30, 2018; March 31, 2018; November 30, 2017; August 31, 2017; May 31, 2017; March 31, 2017; November 28, 2016; August 31, 2016; June 30, 2016; March 31, 2016; December 31, 3015; September 30, 2015; June 30, 2015; April 1, 2015; November 29, 2014.

Pierre's presentation on Data Quality