What IFRS 18 actually changes
IFRS 18 introduces three changes that are directly relevant to how EPM environments are configured for financial reporting.
The first is the restructuring of the income statement into five mandatory categories: operating, investing, financing, income tax, and discontinued operations. This classification is more prescriptive than the IAS 1 framework it replaces. Organizations that have built their Oracle EPM management reporting structure around the previous framework will need to review whether their current account and category structure aligns with the new mandatory presentation.
The second is the introduction of Management Performance Measures. IFRS 18 requires entities that communicate MPMs — non-GAAP financial measures used in public communications — to disclose those measures in the financial statements with reconciliations to the most directly comparable IFRS subtotals. For listed companies and large public-interest entities in the GCC, this introduces a formal reporting requirement around metrics that were previously disclosed at management’s discretion. The EPM environment needs to support the production of that reconciliation as part of the close process, not as a manual offline exercise.
The third is the requirement for comparative restatement. IFRS 18 requires entities to restate comparative periods under the new presentation framework. For organizations using Oracle FCCS or Oracle Cloud EPM, this means the reporting templates and category structure need to support parallel presentation — old format and new format — during the transition period.
Why this is an EPM configuration issue, not just an accounting issue
Finance teams preparing for IFRS 18 typically frame the work as an accounting and disclosure project. The accounting work is genuine and significant. But the EPM configuration work is the part that determines whether the finance team produces the required disclosures efficiently or manually.
An Oracle EPM environment configured for IFRS 18 produces the mandatory income statement categories automatically from the chart of accounts mapping, generates the MPM reconciliations as part of the standard close output, and supports comparative period presentation without requiring a separate offline reconciliation process.
An Oracle EPM environment that has not been configured for IFRS 18 produces a close output that requires the finance team to manually reformat the income statement, manually prepare the MPM disclosures, and manually build the comparative period presentation. That manual work is done under time pressure at period end and carries a material risk of error.
What the assessment looks like
For organizations using Oracle FCCS or Cloud EPM for statutory reporting, an IFRS 18 readiness assessment covers: the current income statement category structure and what needs to change to reflect the five mandatory categories; whether the chart of accounts mapping supports the new classification without material rework; the current disclosure process for non-GAAP metrics and what the EPM system would need to do to support formal MPM disclosure; and the comparative reporting capability — whether the environment can run the old and new presentation formats simultaneously during the transition year.
For most organizations, this assessment takes two to three weeks and produces a specific configuration roadmap. The configuration work itself is targeted — not a reimplementation. The organizations that complete this work before their first IFRS 18 reporting period close faster and with fewer manual interventions than those that address it at the close deadline.
Loop Wise Solutions configures Oracle EPM environments for statutory and regulatory reporting requirements across Egypt and the GCC, including IFRS 18 implementation readiness and Oracle FCCS reporting framework updates.
Contact: Contact@loop-wise.com | www.loop-wise.com
