Deloitte's Roadmap: Initial Public Offerings

Initial Public Offerings

This Roadmap addresses financial reporting, accounting, and auditing considerations to help companies navigate challenges related to preparing an IPO registration statement and ultimately going public.

You must log in to view this content and have a subscription package that includes this content.

Required subscriptions

US GAAP

View all / combine content

Preface On the Radar Contacts Chapter 1 — Introduction to Initial Public Offerings Chapter 2 — Identifying the Required Financial Statements for the Registration Statement Chapter 3 — Financial Statement Preparation and Disclosure Requirements Chapter 4 — Other Registration Statement Reporting Chapter 5 — Accounting Matters Chapter 6 — Audit Considerations Chapter 7 — What to Expect After the Registration Statement Is Declared Effective Appendix A — Common Disclosures on Form S-1 Appendix B — Summary of Scaled Disclosure Requirements Available to SRCs Appendix C — Key Benefits Available to EGCs and Non-EGCs Appendix D — Titles of Standards and Other Literature Appendix E — Abbreviations Appendix F — Roadmap Updates for 2021

Preparing for an IPO can be a complex, time-consuming, and often costly process. Accordingly, this Roadmap addresses financial reporting, accounting, and auditing considerations to help companies navigate challenges related to preparing an IPO registration statement and ultimately going public.

Promoting the U.S. IPO market has continued to be a priority of the SEC. On September 26, 2017, former SEC Chairman Jay Clayton made the following statement before the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs:

It is clear to me that companies that go through the U.S. IPO process emerge as better companies, with better disclosure. We want to encourage and preserve that dynamic. Overall, the SEC will strive for efficiency in our processes to encourage more companies to consider going public, which will result in more choices for investors, job creation and a stronger U.S. economy.

In addition to promoting the IPO market, as part of its disclosure effectiveness initiative, the SEC has been exploring ways to make going public in the U.S. markets more attractive while still protecting investors. On June 23, 2021, SEC Chairman Gary Gensler made the following statement at London City Week in Washington, D.C.:

The SEC was set up in the 1930s by Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the U.S. Congress to look after working families’ savings in the depths of the Great Depression.

Congress passed a number of laws with the same basic ideas — among them, that investors get to decide what risks they wish to take, as long as companies provide appropriate disclosures; that working families should be protected with regard to their investment advisers; and that the stock exchanges themselves should be free of fraud and manipulation.

Those protections put in place by Congress and the early SEC have stood the test of time. I think they’re a large part of our economic success — why the U.S. has the largest, most vibrant capital markets in the world.

The past 12 months have been marked by unprecedented IPO activity, a record-breaking year for SPACs, and the SEC’s publication of numerous final rules to enhance public-company disclosures. Registrants should therefore ensure that they are ready to respond to changing conditions in the financial markets, as well as the SEC’s new disclosure requirements, as they plan for their IPOs.

In addition to containing updated and expanded guidance, the 2021 edition of this Roadmap includes On the Radar, a new section that briefly summarizes emerging issues and trends related to the accounting and financial reporting topics addressed in the publication.