The International Valuation Standard Council (IVSC) recently interviewed David Larsen, Srividya Gopal, and James Gavin, managing directors at Duff & Phelps, A Kroll Business, about their perspectives on current issues facing the valuation profession. Here are some takeaways:

• One result of the pandemic is that the importance of valuation has increased significantly, as has the need for experienced and qualified valuation professionals;
• Over the past two decades, as capital deployed by the alternative asset industry has dramatically increased, the need to institutionalize valuation practices and processes has expanded;
• Great strides have been made to align global valuation standards, such as U.S. GAAP and the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), which have unified most requirements as it relates to, for example, fair value measurements and business combinations;
• More work is needed to find a reliable and consistent measure of the impact of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) initiatives; and
• From a corporate boardroom perspective, there is certainly a lot more awareness of the need for independent valuations or fairness opinions.

You can read the full interview if you click here. It was also mentioned that the Duff & Phelps brand will transition fully to Kroll by the end of 2021.