Financial Reporting

Under the Companies Act, every director of a Singapore company is responsible for ensuring that proper accounting records are kept and that financial statements are prepared and presented fairly. This is not an administrative formality — it carries real legal weight. Director’s Responsibilities Singapore’s Companies Act (Cap. 50) places the responsibility for financial statements squarely on the board of directors. Directors must ensure that: 💡 Directors can delegate the preparation of financial statements to accountants — but they cannot delegate responsibility. Signing off on inaccurate statements carries personal liability. What Financial Statements Must Include A complete set of financial statements for a Singapore company typically comprises: SFRS vs Full SFRS Singapore Financial Reporting Standards for Small Entities (SFRS for SE) is a simplified version of the full SFRS, designed to reduce compliance burden for qualifying small entities. Your company may apply SFRS for SE if it is not publicly accountable and meets at least two of three criteria: revenue ≤ S$10M, total assets ≤ S$10M, or ≤ 50 employees. XBRL Filing with ACRA Companies filing full financial statements with ACRA are generally required to submit data in XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language) format via BizFinx. This is a machine-readable format that allows ACRA to analyse and compare financial data across companies. Small companies exempt from audit may be able to file a simplified set. What Your Financials Should Tell You Beyond compliance, good financial statements should give you genuine business insight. As a director, you should be able to answer: