Angelos Pangratis discusses EU-U.S. trade and international accounting standards. CLICK HERE for the video.

A senior EU diplomat said during a May 9 visit to Atlanta that significant progress may be made in instituting a uniform system of accounting and financial reporting for U.S. and European companies this year.

Angelos Pangratis, deputy head of mission at the European Commission’s embassy in Washington, was in Atlanta celebrating Europe Day, the anniversary of French politician Robert Schuman’s May 9, 1950 proposal calling for greater organization between European nations, which eventually led to the EU’s formation.

He spoke at the Atlanta International School on Europe Day and had lunch with the European consuls in Georgia at the home of Philippe Ardanaz, consul general for France in Atlanta.

During the visit, Mr. Pangratis went to a lunch with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, who was also in Atlanta at the time, and met with former President and First Lady Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter.

The trip was organized by Jim Gaffey, president of the Gaffey Group, an Atlanta-based consulting firm that has brought several European diplomats to Georgia, including John Bruton, former Irish prime minister and current EU ambassador to the U.S.

U.S. companies currently conform to generally accepted accounting principles, or GAAP, while many countries, including the EU, use international financial reporting standards, or IFRS.

Mr. Pangratis, the commission’s top representative behind Mr. Bruton, told GlobalAtlanta that international accounting standards are a top agenda item for groups working to improve EU-U.S. trade.

“We hope that we will see very significant concrete steps taken, to a degree that it will be felt by the companies involved, before the end of the year,” he said.  “We feel we are very close.”

Mr. Pangratis said that a uniform international accounting system would immediately impact companies based in Europe and the U.S. with operations abroad.

“Why should we have double obligations of our companies to report?  If we manage to accept each others’ standards this would be a great facilitation for a lot of companies,” he said.

The Transatlantic Economic Council, or TEC, a group of U.S. Cabinet members and EU Commissioners working to promote greater economic ties between the trading partners, released a statement following a May 13 meeting that said the EU will recognize GAAP standards as equal to the IFRS requirements this year.

EU recognition of U.S. standards could be a step toward integrating the two systems. The transatlantic council’s statement also says it is working on mutual recognition of securities regulations between the U.S. and EU and encouraging any other method of facilitating cross-border financial cooperation.

The meeting in Brussels, home of the European Commission, was the council's second since its formation in April 2007, following an inaugural meeting last November in Washington.

The International Accounting Standards Board, a London-based group of active or former executives and government officials founded in 2001, developed the IFRS system and is promoting its use worldwide.

The EU adopted these standards in 2002 and they are now required or permitted in more than 100 countries.  The board is working to get the standards adopted in other countries, including the U.S.

Proponents of adopting an international accounting system in the U.S. have said in previous news reports that it would simplify the reporting process for companies with operations in other countries.

Critics argue that the conversion would be too expensive, especially for small companies that do not work internationally.  Costs involved could include re-training corporate accountants and working with banks and credit-rating agencies to reconcile their accounting systems.