The Canadian Securities Administrators issued a notice to the Canadian market on Thursday to seek feedback on a new business reporting tool called eXtensible Business Reporting Language.

CSA Notice 52-314, titled Securities Regulators Want Your Feedback on XBRL,provides information on XBRL and links to an online survey to gather comments from the market about their level of awareness of XBRL and what the CSA’s role should be in respect of XBRL.

“The CSA is committed to improving how information is collected and provided to investors, ” says Jean St-Gelais, chair of the CSA and president and CEO of the Autorité des marchés financiers. “This includes finding ways to use technology that could make it easier and more efficient for investors to receive, find, compare and analyze financial information.”

XBRL is a relatively new business reporting language that is emerging as an international standard for communicating business and financial data. The basic concept of XBRL is that it attaches standardized electronic “tags” to elements of information and these tags provide information about what the item represents. The notice provides a brief overview of XBRL, the benefits and costs associated with it, and current trends and developments around the world.

“There have been a number of significant developments with XBRL around the world, and we are interested in understanding the level of awareness of XBRL in the Canadian marketplace,” said Jean St-Gelais.

To ensure that the survey reaches market participants, the CSA will email a copy of the notice and survey to all public companies in Canada and survey to all public companies across Canada.