Your company needs to create a financial (annual or interim) report, and it is your job to see it done. It needs to satisfy your stakeholders, your CEO, and – very importantly – the requirements of regulatory bodies like the stock exchange and the EU. Over the past 20 to 30 years, this has been solved by creating a PDF document. Often a massive PDF document. But regulations have changed, stakeholders’ habits have changed, and it is about time to consider: Is there a better way?
Firstly, let’s discuss why things are changing.
EU regulations (like ESEF and CSRD) are actually banning PDFs, stating that the required official report format shall be an XHTML file (often “tagged” with inline XBRL, depending on your regulatory requirements). And for good reason. The PDF is a bad format for several reasons, like:
OK, so the PDF is bad … but this legislation (ESEF) started already in 2021… Hasn’t everyone moved away from creating PDFs? Not at all, actually. Currently - the legislation adds to the PDF process. Everyone is making a PDF, then converting it to an XHTML copy of the PDF, before – if required – applying inline XBRL tags in a separate software. This makes complete sense, because nobody knows how to solve the following problem:
And the only known way for most people is to make the PDF format, then reuse that for the XHTML format.
Oh, so then it makes sense. We should make PDFs – what could be the problem?
Well, creating a PDF actually creates a lot of unnecessary roadblocks and inefficiencies in your reporting process, such as:
But what is the alternative?
Instead of making a PDF first – you should make the XHTML first. It is the required format. XHTML is actually just HTML (the format of the web, you may recognize it?), so by making that first, you can reuse it for a human readable web report.
Better yet, by making a web report, your report could automatically scale to all digital screen sizes – automatically – making mobile reading a lot easier.
That sounds difficult – I don’t know how to make XHTML documents…!?
Wrepit can help you. We have built the very first “web first” financial reporting process which is easy to use for everyone regardless of designer or developer skills. With Wrepit, you can:
Short summary: Traditionally, financial reports have been created as PDFs, but EU regulations now require XHTML formats due to PDFs' poor machine readability, comparability, and accessibility. Despite this, many still create PDFs and convert them to XHTML, causing inefficiencies. The alternative is to create XHTML first, using a “web first” approach rather than a “PDF first” approach. With Wrepit, anyone can easily succeed with this approach.
Won’t I need to make a PDF for quarterly or interim reports?
No. True, there is no ESEF requirement for interim reports. However, bodies like Euronext and Nasdaq will accept XHTML files for archiving purposes, and web reports for human readability purposes. Just make sure they contain the same information (which they always will if made with Wrepit).
I think perhaps some of my stakeholders require a PDF print-out…?
That may be the case. But over the past 10 years we have seen this isn’t true any longer. And more often most stakeholders will appreciate the well-functioning mobile experience of a proper web report.
And if you just really need a PDF, Wrepit provides a PDF export as well.
Is this approach future-proof?
Absolutely, yes. The EU has decided to establish the ESAP (European Single Access Point) where all the machine-readable reports shall be made available to the public in (you guessed it) a “single access point”. Thus, the PDF will be even less relevant in the future, when everyone can find your reports at the ESAP.
Making a web report sounds costly and time consuming. Is it not?
With Wrepit it definitely is not. It enables a much more efficient process than making a PDF ever could.