TORONTO, May 20 /CNW/ - CNW Group, Canada's leading regulatory filing
agent and news release distributor, will be participating in the U.S.
Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) 60-day comment period regarding the
recently proposed rule for mandatory eXtensible Business Reporting Language
(XBRL) filing program for U.S. and foreign issuers.
    "CNW's participation in the comment period will clarify which taxonomy
and related tags are to be used when furnishing XBRL to the SEC for U.S.
listed Canadian issuers who currently report in Canadian GAAP and reconcile to
U.S. GAAP," said Melanie Kurzuk, Senior Vice President News & Information
Technology Division, CNW Group.
    The proposed XBRL rule calls for a phased approach beginning with the
largest U.S. and foreign accelerated filers (defined as those with a worldwide
public float of $5 billion USD or higher). The plan would initially target
those companies that use U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP),
but would eventually encompass those that use International Financial
Reporting Standards (IFRS).
    Reporting for the first group of companies would begin with fiscal
periods ending on or after Dec. 15, 2008, with submission to EDGAR and on the
company's own corporate website. The following year, all other large
accelerated domestic and foreign filers would begin filing in XBRL format and
in year three, all remaining companies would be required to be XBRL-compliant.
    "We are entering a new era of interactive disclosure and CNW Group will
be rolling out a complete solution for fast, accurate XBRL tagging of
fundamental data in EDGAR and SEDAR filings and is ready to assist companies
to meet mandatory XBRL filing requirements," said Carolyn McGill-Davidson,
Senior Vice President Sales and Marketing, CNW Group.
    "Within Canada, we will also be supporting clients who are interested in
participating in the Canadian Securities Administrators XBRL Voluntary Filing
Program to keep pace with their industry peers in the U.S.," said Kurzuk. "Our
XBRL solution handles multiple accounting standards including U.S. GAAP,
Canadian GAAP and IFRS. This will be of great benefit to all Canadian
companies who are required to move to IFRS accounting standards by 2011."
    CNW Group, a member of XBRL Canada, will be holding a series of XBRL
educational sessions in the coming months for clients and other stakeholders
on how the proposed rule will impact Canadian companies and to present full
details of its XBRL offering.

    About CNW Group

    CNW Group is a global leader in news and information distribution
services for professional communicators. Established in 1960, CNW is part of
the International PR Newswire network, reaching news outlets in 135 countries
worldwide. CNW Group provides electronic news distribution, targeting,
monitoring, translation, Webcast and disclosure services to corporate,
government, associations, labour, non-profit and other customers worldwide.
CNW Group helps Canadian and international organizations to connect with local
and global audiences including the news media, the investment community and
the general public. CNW Group is co-owned by two news distribution
powerhouses: PR Newswire, based in New York City, USA and PA Group, based in
London, UK. www.newswire.ca 1.877.CNW.7890

    About XBRL

    XBRL is a standards-based method with which users can prepare, publish
(in a variety of formats), exchange and analyze financial statements and the
information they contain. XBRL complements XML, which is the universal format
for data on the Web that uses tags (identifiers) to describe and deliver data
from an application. XBRL allows accountants and other financial professionals
and regulatory organizations to identify -- by a tag -- items unique to
business information, such as financial statements.