All FASB articles – Page 18
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Blog
FASB Proposes Changes to Pension Accounting, Disclosures
For companies that still carry defined benefit pension plans, FASB is proposing an update to accounting standards to require companies to separate the service cost from other components of the net benefit cost for purposes of presenting it in financial statements. The proposal outlines specific guidance on how to break ...
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Article
SEC Committee Ups Ante in Fight Against FASB Materiality Changes
Members of the SEC’s Investor Advisory Committee are ramping up their fight with FASB over proposals that redefine its approach to materiality in financial statements. The plan is “fraught with the risk that disclosures that are unfavorable to the issuer are disproportionately viewed as immaterial and as a result excluded ...
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Article
Companies Prep for FASB’s New Take on Leases
Still knee-deep in preparing for the massive new revenue recognition standard, public companies have plenty of reason to start revving up now for another major accounting change on the horizon—the new leasing standard. “As soon as possible—even prior to the issuance of the new leases standard—preparers should consider creating a ...
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Blog
With IASB Leasing Rule Final, FASB Calls on US Companies to Plan Adoption
As the IASB has released its final leasing standard, FASB is now calling on U.S. companies to begin planning to adopt FASB’s incoming lease rules. The board is retaining an accounting model that contemplates two types of leases similar to the way they are categorized in GAAP currently; on the ...
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Blog
Going Concerns Fall in 2014 in “Mixed Bag” of Results
According to the latest data from Audit Analytics, the number of audit opinions that included a question from auditors regarding whether the company could remain in business another year appears to have fallen in 2014 from 2013. Based on this estimation, the research firm says 2014 going-concern opinions finished out ...
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Article
New Accounting Standard Provides a Host of Potential Changes for Financial Reporting
Accounting Standards Update No. 2016-01 is here, and its impact on how to classify and measure financial instruments will mean different things to different companies, especially when it comes to setting valuation. But with a lack of universal impact, this update will require everyone to take a look at their ...
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Blog
IASB Releases Final Lease Standard
Image: The IASB has issued its long-awaited accounting standard requiring assets and liabilities associated with leases to be added to corporate balance sheets. Companies that follow International Financial Reporting Standards have until 2019 to adopt the standard. “It’s been a long road getting to this event,” says Sean Torr, a ...
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Blog
FASB Tackles How to Present Partial Sales of Nonfinancial Assets
In its quest to clarify how to define “business” for the sake of accounting rules, FASB is wading into how to account for partial sales of nonfinancial assets. FASB has tentatively decided that all transactions where an entity retains an equity interest in an asset or receives an equity interest ...
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Blog
FASB Publishes Final Standard on Recognition and Measurement of Financial Instruments
Image: A decade in the making, public companies now have a new standard that tells them how to measure and recognize the value of financial assets and financial liabilities in financial statements. Accounting Standards Update No. 2016-01 rewrites certain requirements under the Accounting Standards Codification for how to recognize, measure, ...
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Blog
Is That Disposal a Discontinued Operation? SEC Staff Offer Views
SEC Associate Chief Accountant Barry Kanczuker says FASB’s new standard on when a particular disposal should be characterized as a discontinued operation isn’t always clear cut. Kanczuker says companies will have to apply judgment to what constitutes a relevant financial result; look at financial results that might be relevant to ...
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Blog
FASB, IASB Agree on Revenue Recognition Solutions
Guidance on when to recognize revenue on a net or gross basis is expected to be highly consistent across U.S. and international rules when the Financial Accounting Standards Board and the International Accounting Standards Board issue their final amendments.
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Blog
2016 GAAP Taxonomy Ready for Use, Pending SEC Approval
FASB has released its final update of the 2016 GAAP Financial Reporting Taxonomy, pending acceptance by the SEC, to allow public companies to prepare to use it to complete their XBRL filings. The annual update allows FASB staff to make the taxonomy easier to navigate and more effective in reflecting ...
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Blog
FASB Seats Transition Group for Impairment, Not Leases
Image: Building on the success of the revenue recognition transition group, FASB is planning a new group to facilitate implementation of the pending financial instrument impairment standard. In recent remarks, FASB Chairman Russ Golden said the TRG has already met to identify any key issues. The board is putting the ...
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Blog
FASB Tests Materiality Ideas With Fair-Value Disclosure Proposal
As part of its effort to improve disclosure requirements, FASB is proposing new disclosure provisions around fair-value measurements to make fair-value disclosures more meaningful to investors. The proposal says entities would provide required disclosures if they are material, and would remove phrases such as “an entity shall disclose at a ...
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Article
Amid Financial Reporting Changes, SEC Offers Cautions
With changes looming on accounting standards for revenue recognition, leases, financial instruments, and more, skittish corporate accountants often turn to the SEC’s Division of Corporation Finance and staff accountants, relying on phone briefings and pre-clearing consultations to get ahead of financial reporting issues before they result in an SEC comment ...
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Article
Little to Fear in New World of Lease Accounting
Accounting for leases is about to undergo a profound change, thanks to a new standard adopted by accounting rulemakers in the United States and overseas. The new standard has its critics; in a special guest column this week, Gary Kabureck—former chief accounting officer of Xerox, now a member of the ...
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Blog
FASB Proposes Changes to Business Definition
FASB is proposing some clarifications to how a business is defined, to help companies following accounting rules related to acquisitions, disposals, goodwill, and consolidation. The board says stakeholders have reported that applying the current definition, as spelled out in U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, sweeps in transactions that don’t really ...
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Article
How to Panic Effectively With So Many Effective Dates Coming
Image: Revenue recognition, leasing, financial instruments—the accounting standards for all three have major changes looming, and that means financial reporting executives have lots of implementation to juggle in a short period. This week we look at how to manage so much change well and which companies face the most work. ...
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Blog
FASB Drops Deferred Tax Classification Requirement
Companies seeking an easier way to classify deferred taxes on the balance sheet have gotten their way: FASB has eliminated that requirement, as part of its effort to simplify accounting standards. The change to accounting rules now makes U.S. GAAP requirements more consistent with those in International Financial Reporting Standards. ...
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Article
FASB Ideas on Materiality Reform Draw Heat, Questions
Image: An effort to align the accounting world’s definition of materiality with how the idea is widely understood in legal circles is sparking a fierce debate in corporate accounting circles, with potentially big consequences for financial reporting. “More information or more disclosure is better than less, in general,” said Damon ...