By 2005, all companies listed on European Union exchanges must adopt IFRS14 and the SEC continues to consider whether foreign firms should be able to list on a U.S. exchange using IFRS. In October 2002, the IASB and the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) jointly issued a memorandum of understanding, which formally stated their commitment to the convergence of IFRS and U.S. GAAP. The adoption of IFRS in numerous countries will generate interesting additional flows of accounting information, which will create more research questions and more opportunities for empirical research