Therefore, we predict that countries with their own local GAAP as the primary set of accounting
standards are less likely to adopt IFRS for SMEs. In addition, we expect that influential lobbying
groups like auditors and national standard setters will be likely to be biased against
internationally developed standards because these institutions fear the loss of their influence
over accounting standard setting to the IASB.
On the other hand, however, many jurisdictions such as Oman, Panama, or Barbados do not
have own developed national accounting systems. Both full IFRS and IFRS for SMEs represent
an international set of accounting standards, and it remains unclear whether these countries are
capable of developing their own local GAAP that would provide equivalent accounting quality
relative to the IASB’s accounting standards. For instance, with respect to adoption of full
IFRS, government representatives from Kazakhstan note that ‘there was no reason for Kazakhstan
100 D. Kaya and M. Koch
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to independently develop what has already been developed elsewhere in the world’ (Tyrrall et al.
2007, p. 92).