US SEC to weigh XBRL adoption schedule on April 21

WASHINGTON, April 16 (Reuters) - The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is expected to lay out a roadmap on Monday for companies to file their results in a format aimed at making it easier for investors to analyze financial data.

The SEC currently has a voluntary pilot program in which more than 70 companies file their financial data in XBRL, or extensible business reporting language. XBRL electronic tags are much like bar codes and can be attached to each piece of financial data.

The SEC issued a notice late on Tuesday saying commissioners will meet to consider "amendments to provide for corporate financial statement information to be filed with the commission in interactive data format, and a near- and long-term schedule..."

The agency has previously said it would propose companies be required to file in XBRL, possibly in a staged approach with the largest companies subject to the requirement first.

The agency's push for XBRL has been led by SEC Chairman Christopher Cox, an advocate of using technology to enhance companies' transparency and investor knowledge.

Last year, the agency began allowing mutual funds to submit risk/return summaries from their prospectuses in XBRL, with 20 funds having voluntarily done so since August.

The SEC has also launched online tools, that can be accessed at 209.234.225.154/viewer/home/ , that let investors analyze and compare XBRL data from companies' financial statements and mutual fund data.

Members of an SEC advisory committee have voiced some concerns about the cost for companies to adopt XBRL and any liability that might result from not properly following accounting standards when coding the data.

The committee issued an interim report in February that recommended the SEC go forward with a plan to require companies to use XBRL, but allowing a phased-in approach.

XBRL US, a consortium which is helping build the XBRL language and support its adoption, said on Wednesday it plans to complete a guide of XBRL tags that correlate to U.S. generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP). (Reporting by Karey Wutkowski; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)