The business valuation profession is still among the newest, and it continues to evolve new standards and methodologies to meet financial reporting and business needs. The International Valuation Standard Council (IVSC) recently interviewed David Larsen, Srividya Gopal, and James Gavin, managing directors at Kroll, to get their perspectives on current issues facing the valuation profession. Among the themes the panel addressed are:

• The importance and scope of the business valuation profession has increased significantly during the pandemic.
• This growing need may have outpaced the availability of experienced and qualified valuation professionals.
• Over the past two decades, capital the alternative asset industry deployed has dramatically increased. This accelerates the current need for the profession to “institutionalize valuation practices and processes.”
• The BV profession has participated in aligning global valuation standards related to fair value measurements and business combinations, even within U.S. GAAP and the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS).
• While the investment community have absorbed ESG initiatives, it’s been a more difficult road to make these tools reliable and consistent in the context of existing valuation methods and practices, so more work needs to be done.
• Finally, more corporate boards are fully aware of the need for—and benefits from—independent valuations or fairness opinions.