How to account for intercompany loans under IFRS

During my audit days in Arthur Andersen I had a privilege to lead audit engagements in a few subsidiaries of international holdings and groups. For me, it was very interesting and educative. First of all I learned that the local management of these subsidiaries is often just a formal function and the real decisions are … Read more

How to Consolidate Special Purpose Entity

I lost my first serious job in Arthur Andersen in 2001. I was devastated, because I really loved that job. Yes, it was full of hard work and long overtimes, but it was the best accounting and auditing school ever. How did I lose my job? Well, Arthur Andersed died after the big accounting scandal … Read more

IAS 38: Intangible Asset or Expense?

Recently I had an argument with auditors of one company related to the customer list they bought. The company paid significant amount of cash for the list of customers of telecommunications. The list contained the names, addresses and phone numbers of all the clients. And, the buyer intended to use the list to contact the … Read more

How to Account for Intangible Assets under IAS 38

Many companies incur huge costs from which they expect to benefit in the future. For example, companies pay salaries to software engineers who develop some game or an application. Well, how would you treat these costs? It does not feel OK to put all salaries of these engineers in profit or loss when they are … Read more

Example: Construction contracts under IFRS 15

Ever since the new revenue standard IFRS 15 Revenue from Contracts with Customers was issued, I get one and the same question: What happened to construction contracts? They were guided by IAS 11 Construction Contracts, but you might well know that after 1 January 2018, IAS 11 became superseded – it does NOT apply anymore. … Read more

Example: IFRS 10 Disposal of Subsidiary

Some time ago I published an article with an example of very simple method of consolidating a parent and a subsidiary. This article still applies and you can learn the basic steps and methodology of consolidation with a nice video in it. Many of my readers then asked me for a different situation: How to … Read more

How to Present Financial Instruments under IAS 32

There are three IFRS covering the area of the most complex IFRS topic – financial instruments: IAS 32 Presentation of Financial Statements – this standard contains basic definitions and rules for presenting of financial instruments; IFRS 7 Financial Instruments: Disclosures – here, you can find a list of all necessary information that you need to … Read more

How to make a change in functional currency

Some time ago I was a part of an audit team auditing the financial statements of a medium-sized manufacturing company. When we received the trial balance of that client, we spotted something strange: There were loads of transactions in a foreign currency and resulting impact of constant conversion to the local currency on profit or … Read more

How to account for free assets received under IFRS

The best things in life are free… … at least that’s what Janet Jackson sang in one of her top hits. However, when your company receives some free assets, then the question is: Are they really received at no cost and no strings attached? Is there something else behind? Many years ago I attended the … Read more