The Financial Accounting Standards Board has made available the 2012 U.S. GAAP Financial Reporting Taxonomy, which can be used to submit XBRL-format financial filings to the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The taxonomy was released Wednesday, pending final acceptance by the SEC. FASB is now responsible for the ongoing development and maintenance of the taxonomy for public issuers registered with the SEC, having taken over the task from XBRL US two years ago.

The 2012 U.S. GAAP Financial Reporting Taxonomy contains updates for accounting standards and other improvements to the 2011 taxonomy currently used by SEC issuers.  FASB issued proposed improvements to the taxonomy in the fall, allowing users of the taxonomy to provide feedback on the updates and to provide SEC filers, service providers, software vendors, and others the opportunity to become familiar with and incorporate new element names for their filings.

The U.S. GAAP 2012 taxonomy is available for download here.

Questions about using the taxonomy for creating and submitting Extensible Business Reporting Language-tagged interactive data files in compliance with SEC rules should be directed to the SEC.  SEC contact details and guidance are available at the SEC’s portal on XBRL.

The U.S. GAAP Financial Reporting Taxonomy provides a list of computer-readable tags in XBRL that allows companies to tag thousands of pieces of financial data included in typical long-form financial statements and related footnote disclosures.  The tags allow computers to automatically search for, assemble, and process data so it can be readily accessed and analyzed by investors, analysts, journalists and regulators. 

In early 2010, the Financial Accounting Foundation assumed maintenance responsibilities for the taxonomy, and, along with FASB, assembled a team of technical staff dedicated to updating the taxonomy for changes in U.S. GAAP, identifying best practices in taxonomy extensions and technical enhancements.