FASB issues exposure draft on pension disclosures.

• Position: Accounting & auditing news - Financial Accounting Standards Board - Brief Article

In Sept., the Financial Accounting Standards Board issued an exposure draft Employers' Disclosures about Pensions and Other Postretirement Benefits, which would improve financial statement disclosures for defined benefit plans. The project was initiated by the FASB earlier this year in response to concerns raised by investors and other users of financial statements about the need for greater transparency of pension information. Comments were due late last month.

To provide the public with better and more complete information, the FASB plans to require that companies provide more details about their plan assets, benefit obligations, cash flows, benefit costs and other relevant information. For the first time, companies would be required to provide financial statement users with a breakdown of plan assets by category, such as equity, debt and real estate. The expected rates of return and target allocation percentages, or target ranges, for these asset categories also would be required in financial statements.

Cash flows would include...