US banks are to have their off-balance-sheet vehicles which contributed to more than $150bn (£75.5bn) in writedowns scrutinised by the standard-setter.
The Financial Accounting Standards Board wants to try to determine whether the credit turmoil problems were a result of the accounting rules, the disclosure requirements of banks or the way in which they complied with the rules allowed, Reuters reported.
FASB chairman Robert Herz said it isn't yet clear whether the rules should be changed, disclosure requirements increased, or whether banks should be forced to stricter compliance with existing rules.
'Whenever you have a stress test like this in the market and people are saying there are reporting problems, we need to understand the nature of those problems and to what extent there's something we have to change," Herz said. " But we also don't want to have blanket rules that make everyone consolidate everything,' Herz said.
Although the relevant accounting rules were created to limit off-balance-sheet structures, following similar issues that led to Enron's collapse, banks found a way around these.
Further reading:
Financial regulation at the heart of the sub-prime storm
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