PREVIEW-XBRL data will shake up investment landscape

NEW YORK Nov 30 (Reuters) - The day when stock investors around the world instantly scan and analyze dozens of corporate results in one swoop is fast approaching.

U.S. regulators are expected to propose as soon as April that companies be required to file financial statements in a machine-readable computer language called extensible business reporting language, or XBRL.

This would give U.S. companies time to adapt to post 2008 annual results in XBRL format -- a global standard that enables investors to instantly analyze detailed financial numbers across a swath of companies.

"The speed of information in the marketplace will dramatically increase, error rates will drop dramatically and the quality of the data will leap exponentially," said Dan Roberts, a director at accounting firm Grant Thornton. "You will not be able to hide information on page 74 anymore. It's going to do to financial reports what the Internet did to the Yellow Pages."

And the change is taking place worldwide: Japan, China and others are requiring XBRL filings or are about to.

The implications of these changes for investors, research analysts, accountants, regulators, data vendors and financial journalists will be discussed at a gathering in Vancouver this week.

The guest of honor at the 16th annual XBRL International Conference, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox, has been pushing XBRL because he believes it makes it easier and cheaper to analyze data.

But XBRL in regulatory filings alone does not do much for most investors as these documents often are filed weeks after news releases or stock exchange notices. But XBRL experts are betting companies will translate those documents into XBRL, making a wealth of data available instantly to everybody.

"Once XBRL is mandated in the U.S. market, it's going to take off," said Jack Roehrig, a 30-year Merrill Lynch & Co Inc MER.N veteran who is now with consulting firm Jordan & Jordan.

XBRL WHAT?

For the past few years, Cox has tried to coax U.S. companies to file XBRL reports voluntarily, but only about 60 have complied. Many CFOs, Wall Street analysts and investors are clueless about XBRL, while most bookkeepers are focused on implementing 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley corporate reforms.

A Grant Thornton survey in September showed that just 53 percent of 200-plus CFOs polled knew what XBRL does. A July poll of 864 investment professionals by the Chartered Financial Analyst Institute showed similar ignorance.

But that will change quickly once investors realize there is money to be made, said Dane Mott, an analyst at Bear Stearns Co Inc BSC.N who has been a leading XBRL advocate on Wall Street.

"Investors are very action-oriented," Mott said. "If there's a mandate that draws a line in the sand, I can guarantee you investors will be ready."

The reason: Once XBRL is available in real time, investors who can feed the numbers into their "black boxes," or computer trading models, will have a leg up on others. Even more so once XBRL is extended to measures such as average revenue per user for mobile operators and identifies forecast earnings per share in news releases.

That day might not be far off. The de facto real-time distributors of U.S. corporate information, PR Newswire and BusinessWire, are preparing for XBRL.

"Are they up to speed? Absolutely," said Michelle Savage, a former PR Newswire executive now with XBRL US, Inc. "But the push is not going to come from the companies; the analysts have to step up to the plate."

BEWARE OF CHARLATANS

While progress has been slow in the United States, the rest of the world is embracing XBRL.

"This isn't just a 'what-if' type of thing -- it's happening," said Anthony Fragnito, chief executive of XBRL International, a consortium of about 480 companies and organizations, including Reuters Group Plc RTR.L, that develop and promote XBRL.

European central banks are using XBRL -- which can communicate data in any language -- for Basel II reporting and the UK plans to make XBRL mandatory for filing company tax returns in 2010.

XBRL involves start-up costs, but eventually should save money because it would allow companies to file just one XBRL coded report for multiple agencies.

"Imagine if the SEC, the IRS and the Federal Reserve boards all used the same accounting dictionary," said Diane Muller, who chairs the upcoming XBRL International Conference and is Vice President of XBRL Development at Just Systems. "This is about lessening the burden on the filers."

It can also help policing. XBRL data tags have played a large role in helping the SEC uncover U.S. companies involved in options backdating over the past year.

And for stock analysts, XBRL could ease the transfer of data into big spreadsheets without retyping the information.

"It will allow everybody to create the kind of analytics you see on the trader's desktop," Muller said.

That is the future. In the present, expect to see hot demand for XBRL experts once the SEC issues its mandate.

"The immediate effect is a massive shortage of XBRL experts," Roberts said. "Then you'll see a lot of people claiming 10-years of XBRL experience standing up. Beware of charlatans!" (Reporting by Emily Chasan and Jack Reerink; editing by Andre Grenon)