Digitalisation of financial reporting is finding its way into the financial markets. With the availability of "interactive data" in the EDGAR system of the US SEC and the latest announcements of the European Commission in regard to the renewal of the Transparency Directive, it is obvious that regulators and standard-setters regard XBRL (eXtensible business reporting language) as the solution for adding value to the dissemination of financial information. In this article we evaluate the ways in which XBRL can be used by a group that is often forgotten in discussions on digitalisation of financial reporting: the users of financial information.
