MBRS & XBRL Glossary

MBRS

Malaysian Business Reporting System — the digital platform SSM uses for companies to submit Annual Returns, Financial Statements, and Exemption Applications, built on the XBRL data format.

XBRL

eXtensible Business Reporting Language — the international, open data standard used to tag financial and business data so it can be read and processed by computers, not just humans.

SSM

Suruhanjaya Syarikat Malaysia, also known in English as the Companies Commission of Malaysia — the regulator responsible for company registration and statutory filings, including MBRS.

SSMxT

The SSM Taxonomy — the standardised dictionary of approved reporting elements (labels) that financial and non-financial data is tagged against when preparing an MBRS filing.

mTool

The MBRS Preparation Tool — a free, Excel-based application provided by SSM used to enter and tag data before it is submitted through mPortal.

mPortal

The MBRS Portal — the online platform, reached through SSM4U/MyCoID, used to upload, digitally sign, track, and pay for an MBRS submission.

MyCoID

SSM's foundational company identification and portal system that underlies access to MBRS and other SSM digital services.

SSM4U

The user account layer providing access to SSM's suite of digital services, including reaching mPortal for MBRS submissions.

MFRS

Malaysian Financial Reporting Standards — the accounting framework generally applied by public companies, and one of two standards the SSM Taxonomy is built around.

MPERS

Malaysian Private Entity Reporting Standards — the accounting framework generally applied by most private companies, the second of the two standards behind the SSM Taxonomy.

Annual Return (AR)

A yearly statutory filing updating a company's core particulars — directors, shareholders, registered office, and share capital — due within 30 days of the company's incorporation anniversary.

Financial Statements (FS)

A company's audited or unaudited accounts, which must be prepared and tagged in XBRL format before lodgement with SSM through MBRS.

Exemption Application (EA)

A formal request for relief from a specific part of the standard MBRS filing requirement. There are three defined types: EA1, EA2, and EA3.

EA1

Exemption Application type requesting relief from aligning a foreign subsidiary's financial year end with its Malaysian holding company's financial year end.

EA2

Exemption Application type requesting relief from filing a full XBRL financial statement, allowing a reduced Key Financial Indicators (KFI) filing instead, once approved.

EA3

Exemption Application type allowing an eligible foreign company to waive the lodgement of financial statements with SSM entirely.

Key Financial Indicators (KFI)

A reduced set of core financial figures that can be filed in XBRL instead of a full financial statement, available only after an approved EA2 exemption. Informally called "Simplified XBRL."

MBRS 2.0

The enhanced version of MBRS, announced by SSM on 26 November 2024 and phased in from December 2024, with a rebuilt taxonomy and expanded coverage, fully mandatory for financial statements from 1 June 2025.

PKI Digital Certificate

The digital signature credential required by the person acting as Lodger to sign and submit an MBRS filing through mPortal.

Lodger

The authorised individual — often a company secretary — who holds the PKI digital certificate and formally submits a filing through mPortal.

Late Lodgement Fee

An administrative charge for submitting a filing after its statutory due date. SSM has periodically issued temporary waivers of this fee during the MBRS 2.0 transition, without changing the underlying statutory deadline.

Audit Exemption

A separate approval, generally available to dormant, zero-revenue, or small-threshold companies, exempting a company's financial statements from requiring sign-off by a licensed auditor — distinct from exemption from filing altogether.

iXBRL

Inline XBRL — a variant that embeds machine-readable XBRL tags directly inside a human-readable HTML document. Used by the US SEC (since 2018) and the UK's incoming Companies House mandate; MBRS uses standard (non-inline) XBRL.

SEC / EDGAR

The United States' Securities and Exchange Commission and its EDGAR filing system, which has required XBRL (now Inline XBRL) from public companies since 2009.

Companies House

The United Kingdom's registrar of companies, which is moving to require iXBRL filing from all UK-registered companies regardless of size, confirmed to take effect from April 2028.

ACRA / BizFinx

Singapore's Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority and its free XBRL preparation tool, BizFinx — the Singaporean equivalent of SSM and mTool.