This page is an index of accounting topics. {{AlphanumericTOC, align=center, nobreak=, numbers=, references=, externallinks=, top=}

A

Accounting ethics - Accounting information system -

Accounting research Accounting research examines how accounting is used by individuals, organizations and government as well as the consequences that these practices have. Starting from the assumption that accounting both measures and makes visible certain economic ...

- Activity-Based Costing - Assets

B

Balance sheet In financial accounting, a balance sheet (also known as statement of financial position or statement of financial condition) is a summary of the financial balances of an individual or organization, whether it be a sole proprietorship, a business ...

- Big Four auditors -

Bond Bond or bonds may refer to: Common meanings * Bond (finance), a type of debt security * Bail bond, a commercial third-party guarantor of surety bonds in the United States * Chemical bond, the attraction of atoms, ions or molecules to form chemical ...

Bookkeeping Bookkeeping is the recording of financial transactions, and is part of the process of accounting in business and other organizations. It involves preparing source documents for all transactions, operations, and other events of a business. Tr ...

- Book value

C

Cash-basis accounting The cash method of accounting, also known as cash-basis accounting, cash receipts and disbursements method of accounting or cash accounting (the EU VAT directive vocabulary Article 226) records revenue when cash is received, and expenses when the ...

Cash-basis versus accrual-basis accounting A basis of accounting is the time various financial transactions are recorded. The cash basis (EU VAT vocabulary ''cash accounting'') and the accrual basis are the two primary methods of tracking income and expenses in accounting. Both can ...

Cash flow statement In financial accounting, a cash flow statement, also known as ''statement of cash flows'', is a financial statement that shows how changes in balance sheet accounts and income affect cash and cash equivalents, and breaks the analysis down to oper ...

- Certified General Accountant -

Certified Management Accountant Certified Management Accountant (CMA) is a professional certification credential in the management accounting and financial management fields. The certification signifies that the person possesses knowledge in the areas of financial planning, ana ...

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Certified Public Accountant Certified Public Accountant (CPA) is the title of qualified accountants in numerous countries in the English-speaking world. It is generally equivalent to the title of chartered accountant in other English-speaking countries. In the United Sta ...

- Chartered accountant -

Chart of accounts A chart of accounts (COA) is a list of financial accounts set up, usually by an accountant, for an organization, and available for use by the bookkeeper for recording transactions in the organization's general ledger. Accounts may be added t ...

- Common stock -

Comprehensive income In company financial reporting in the United States, comprehensive Income (or comprehensive earnings) "includes all changes in equity during a period except those resulting from investments by owners and distributions to owners". Because that use ...

- Construction accounting -

Convention of conservatism In accounting, the convention of conservatism, also known as the doctrine of prudence, is a policy of anticipating possible future losses but not future gains. This policy tends to understate rather than overstate net assets and net income, and ...

- Convention of disclosure - Cost accounting -

Cost of capital In economics and accounting, the cost of capital is the cost of a company's funds (both debt and equity), or from an investor's point of view is "the required rate of return on a portfolio company's existing securities". It is used to evaluate new ...

- Cost of goods sold -

Creative accounting Creative accounting is a euphemism referring to accounting practices that may follow the letter of the rules of standard accounting practices, but deviate from the spirit of those rules with questionable accounting ethics—specifically distortin ...

- Credit - Credit note -

Current asset In accounting, a current asset is any asset which can reasonably be expected to be sold, consumed, or exhausted through the normal operations of a business within the current fiscal year or operating cycle or financial year (whichever period is ...

- Current liability

D

Debit Debits and credits in double-entry bookkeeping are entries made in account ledgers to record changes in value resulting from business transactions. A debit entry in an account represents a transfer of value ''to'' that account, and a credit en ...

capital reserve -

Debit note A debit note or debit memorandum (memo) is a commercial document issued by a buyer to a seller as a means of formally requesting a credit note. Debit note acts as the Source document to the Purchase returns journal. In other words it is an ev ...

Debt Debt is an obligation that requires one party, the debtor, to pay money or other agreed-upon value to another party, the creditor. Debt is a deferred payment, or series of payments, which differentiates it from an immediate purchase. The ...

Deficit (disambiguation) A deficit is the amount by which a sum falls short of some reference amount. Economics * Balance of payments deficit, when the balance of payments is negative * Government budget deficit * Deficit spending, the amount by which spending exceeds r ...

Depreciation In accountancy, depreciation is a term that refers to two aspects of the same concept: first, the actual decrease of fair value of an asset, such as the decrease in value of factory equipment each year as it is used and wear, and second, the a ...

Diluted earnings per share Earnings per share (EPS) is the monetary value of earnings per outstanding share of common stock for a company. It is a key measure of corporate profitability and is commonly used to price stocks. In the United States, the Financial Accounting ...

Dividend A dividend is a distribution of profits by a corporation to its shareholders. When a corporation earns a profit or surplus, it is able to pay a portion of the profit as a dividend to shareholders. Any amount not distributed is taken to be re-in ...

- Double-entry bookkeeping system -

Dual aspect Double-entry bookkeeping, also known as double-entry accounting, is a method of bookkeeping that relies on a two-sided accounting entry to maintain financial information. Every entry to an account requires a corresponding and opposite entry to ...

E

E-accounting E-accounting (or online accounting) is the application of online and Internet technologies to the business accounting function. Similar to e-mail being an electronic version of traditional mail, e-accounting is "electronic enablement" of lawful ac ...

EBIT EBIT, Ebit or ebit may refer to: *EBIT, or Earnings before interest and taxes, in finance *EBIT, or Electron beam ion trap, in physics *An ebit (quantum state), a two-party quantum state with quantum entanglement Quantum entanglement is the ph ...

EBITDA A company's earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (commonly abbreviated EBITDA, pronounced , , or ) is a measure of a company's profitability of the operating business only, thus before any effects of indebtedness, stat ...

Earnings per share Earnings per share (EPS) is the monetary value of earnings per outstanding share of common stock for a company. It is a key measure of corporate profitability and is commonly used to price stocks. In the United States, the Financial Accounting ...

Engagement Letter {{Unreferenced, date=December 2009 :''This article uses the word engagement in a legal sense.'' An engagement letter defines the legal relationship (or engagement) between a professional firm (e.g., law, investment banking, consulting, advisory or ...

Entity concept In accounting, a business or an organization and its owners are treated as two separately parties. This is called the entity concept. The business stands apart from other organizations as a separate economic unit. It is necessary to record the b ...

- Environmental accounting -

Expense An expense is an item requiring an outflow of money, or any form of fortune in general, to another person or group as payment for an item, service, or other category of costs. For a tenant, rent is an expense. For students or parents, tuition is a ...

Equity Equity may refer to: Finance, accounting and ownership * Equity (finance), ownership of assets that have liabilities attached to them ** Stock, equity based on original contributions of cash or other value to a business ** Home equity, the dif ...

Equivalent Annual Cost In finance, the equivalent annual cost (EAC) is the cost per year of owning and operating an asset over its entire lifespan. It is calculated by dividing the negative NPV of a project by the "present value of annuity factor": EAC = \frac, where ...

F

Financial Accounting Standards Board The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) is a private standard-setting body whose primary purpose is to establish and improve Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) within the United States in the public's interest. The Securi ...

- Financial accountancy -

Financial audit A financial audit is conducted to provide an opinion whether "financial statements" (the information is verified to the extent of reasonable assurance granted) are stated in accordance with specified criteria. Normally, the criteria are internat ...

Financial reports Financial statements (or financial reports) are formal records of the financial activities and position of a business, person, or other entity. Relevant financial information is presented in a structured manner and in a form which is easy to un ...

- Financial statements -

Fixed assets A fixed asset, also known as long-lived assets or property, plant and equipment (PP&E), is a term used in accounting for assets and property that may not easily be converted into cash. Fixed assets are different from current assets, such as cas ...

Fixed assets management Fixed assets management is an accounting process that seeks to track fixed assets for the purposes of financial accounting, preventive maintenance, and theft deterrence. Organizations face a significant challenge to track the location, quantity, co ...

- Forensic accounting -

Fraud deterrence Fraud deterrence has gained public recognition and spotlight since the 2002 inception of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. Of the many reforms enacted through Sarbanes-Oxley, one major goal was to regain public confidence in the reliability of financial mark ...

- Free cash flow - Fund accounting

G

Gain Gain or GAIN may refer to: Science and technology * Gain (electronics), an electronics and signal processing term * Antenna gain * Gain (laser), the amplification involved in laser emission * Gain (projection screens) * Information gain in de ...

- General ledger -

Generally Accepted Accounting Principles Publicly traded companies typically are subject to rigorous standards. Small and midsized businesses often follow more simplified standards, plus any specific disclosures required by their specific lenders and shareholders. Some firms operate on th ...

- Going concern - Goodwill -

Governmental Accounting Standards Board The Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) is the source of generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) used by state and local governments in the United States. As with most of the entities involved in creating GAAP in the United Stat ...

H

Historical cost -

History of accounting The history of accounting or accountancy can be traced to ancient civilizations.Keith, Robson. 1992. “Accounting Numbers as ‘inscription’: Action at a Distance and the Development of Accounting.” ''Accounting, Organizations and Society'' 1 ...

I

Income -

Income statement An income statement or profit and loss accountProfessional English in Use - Finance, Cambridge University Press, p. 10 (also referred to as a ''profit and loss statement'' (P&L), ''statement of profit or loss'', ''revenue statement'', ''stateme ...

Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) is a professional membership organisation that promotes, develops and supports chartered accountants and students around the world. As of July 2022, it has over 198,000 members ...

- Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland -

Institute of Management Accountants The Institute of Management Accountants (IMA), formerly known as the National Association of Cost Accountants (NACA), is a professional organization of accountants. History IMA was founded in 1919 in Buffalo, New York as the National Associ ...

- Intangible asset -

Interest In finance and economics, interest is payment from a borrower or deposit-taking financial institution to a lender or depositor of an amount above repayment of the principal sum (that is, the amount borrowed), at a particular rate. It is distinct ...

Internal audit Internal auditing is an independent, objective assurance and consulting activity designed to add value and improve an organization's operations. It helps an organization accomplish its objectives by bringing a systematic, disciplined approach to ...

International Accounting Standards Board The International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) is the independent accounting standard-setting body of the IFRS Foundation. The IASB was founded on April 1, 2001, as the successor to the International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC). ...

International Accounting Standards Committee The International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC) was founded in June 1973 in London at the initiative of Sir Henry Benson, former president of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales. The IASC was created by national acc ...

International Accounting Standards International Financial Reporting Standards, commonly called IFRS, are accounting standards issued by the IFRS Foundation and the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB). They constitute a standardised way of describing the company's fin ...

- International Federation of Accountants -

International Financial Reporting Standards International Financial Reporting Standards, commonly called IFRS, are accounting standards issued by the IFRS Foundation and the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB). They constitute a standardised way of describing the company's f ...

Inventory Inventory (American English) or stock (British English) refers to the goods and materials that a business holds for the ultimate goal of resale, production or utilisation. Inventory management is a discipline primarily about specifying the shap ...

Investment Investment is the dedication of money to purchase of an asset to attain an increase in value over a period of time. Investment requires a sacrifice of some present asset, such as time, money, or effort. In finance, the purpose of investing i ...

Invoice An invoice, bill or tab is a commerce, commercial document issued by a sales, seller to a buyer relating to a sale transaction and indicating the product (business), products, quantities, and agreed-upon prices for products or Service (economic ...

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Indian Accounting Standards Indian Accounting Standard (abbreviated as Ind-AS) is the Accounting standard adopted by companies in India and issued under the supervision of Accounting Standards Board (ASB) which was constituted as a body in the year 1977. ASB is a committe ...

J

Job costing Job costing is accounting which tracks the costs and revenues by "job" and enables standardized reporting of profitability by job. For an accounting system to support job costing, it must allow job numbers to be assigned to individual items of exp ...

- Journal

L

Lean accounting Lean, leaning or LEAN may refer to: Business practices * Lean thinking, a business methodology adopted in various fields ** Lean construction, an adaption of lean manufacturing principles to the design and construction process ** Lean government ...

Ledger A ledger is a book or collection of accounts in which account transactions are recorded. Each account has an opening or carry-forward balance, and would record each transaction as either a debit or credit in separate columns, and the ending or ...

- Liability - Long-term asset -

Long-term liabilities Long-term liabilities, or non-current liabilities, are liabilities that are due beyond a year or the normal operation period of the company. The normal operation period is the amount of time it takes for a company to turn inventory into cash. On a ...

- Loss on sale of residential property

M

Maker-checker Maker-checker (or Maker and Checker, or 4-Eyes) is one of the central principles of authorization in the information system An information system (IS) is a formal, sociotechnical, organizational system designed to collect, process, store, and ...

- Management accounting - Management Assertions - Mark-to-market accounting - Matching principle - Materiality -

Money measurement concept The money measurement concept (also called monetary measurement concept) underlines the fact that in accounting and economics generally, every recorded event or transaction is measured in terms of money, the local currency monetary unit of measur ...

Mortgage loan A mortgage loan or simply mortgage (), in civil law jurisdicions known also as a hypothec loan, is a loan used either by purchasers of real property to raise funds to buy real estate, or by existing property owners to raise funds for any p ...

N

Negative assurance Negative assurance within accounting ethics (also known as limited assurance), is a method used by the Certified Public Accountant to assure various parties, such as bankers and stockbrokers, that financial data under review by them is reasonabl ...

Net income In business and accounting, net income (also total comprehensive income, net earnings, net profit, bottom line, sales profit, or credit sales) is an entity's income minus cost of goods sold, expenses, depreciation and amortization, interest, a ...

- Notes to the Financial Statements

O

OBERAC - One-for-one checking -

Online Accounting E-accounting (or online accounting) is the application of online and Internet technologies to the business accounting function. Similar to e-mail being an electronic version of traditional mail, e-accounting is "electronic enablement" of lawful ac ...

Operating expense An operating expense, operating expenditure, operational expense, operational expenditure or opex is an ongoing cost for running a product, business, or system . Its counterpart, a capital expenditure (capex), is the cost of developing or provid ...

- Ownership equity

P

Payroll -

Petty cash Petty cash is a small amount of discretionary funds in the form of cash used for expenditures where it is not sensible to make any disbursement by cheque, because of the inconvenience and costs of writing, signing, and then cashing the cheque. ...

- Philosophy of Accounting - Preferred stock - P/E ratio -

Positive accounting Positive accounting is the branch of academic accounting research that seeks to explain and predict actual accounting practices. This contrasts with normative accounting, that seeks to derive and prescribe "optimal" accounting standards. Backgr ...

Positive assurance Positive assurance within accounting ethics, is the affirmation that a Certified Public Accountant believes a something to be true or correct. Issuing an opinion that the financial statements are presented fairly in conformity with U.S. GAAP is an ...

PricewaterhouseCoopers PricewaterhouseCoopers is an international professional services brand of firms, operating as partnerships under the PwC brand. It is the second-largest professional services network in the world and is considered one of the Big Four accounting ...

Profit and loss account An income statement or profit and loss accountProfessional English in Use - Finance, Cambridge University Press, p. 10 (also referred to as a ''profit and loss statement'' (P&L), ''statement of profit or loss'', ''revenue statement'', ''stateme ...

- Pro-forma amount - Production accounting -

Project accounting Project accounting is a type of managerial accounting oriented toward the goals of project management and delivery. It involves tracking, reporting, and analyzing financial results and implications, and sometimes the creation of financial repor ...

R

Retained earnings -

Revenue In accounting, revenue is the total amount of income generated by the sale of goods and services related to the primary operations of the business. Commercial revenue may also be referred to as sales or as turnover. Some companies receive reven ...

Revenue recognition The revenue recognition principle is a cornerstone of accrual accounting together with the matching principle. They both determine the accounting period in which revenues and expenses are recognized. According to the principle, revenues are recog ...

S

Security Security is protection from, or resilience against, potential harm (or other unwanted coercive change) caused by others, by restraining the freedom of others to act. Beneficiaries (technically referents) of security may be of persons and social ...

Sales journal A sales journal is a specialized accounting journal and it is also a prime entry book used in an accounting system to keep track of the sales of items that customers(debtors) have purchased on account by charging a receivable on the debit side of ...

- Social accounting -

Spreadsheet A spreadsheet is a computer application for computation, organization, analysis and storage of data in tabular form. Spreadsheets were developed as computerized analogs of paper accounting worksheets. The program operates on data entered in cel ...

Statement of changes in equity A statement of changes in equity and similarly the statement of changes in owner's equity for a sole trader, statement of changes in partners' equity for a partnership, statement of changes in shareholders' equity for a company or statement of cha ...

Statutory accounting principles The statutory accounting principles are a set of accounting rules for insurance companies set forth by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. They are used to prepare the statutory financial statements of insurance companies. Statutor ...

Stock option In finance, an option is a contract which conveys to its owner, the ''holder'', the right, but not the obligation, to buy or sell a specific quantity of an underlying asset or instrument at a specified strike price on or before a specified dat ...

- Stock split -

Stock In finance, stock (also capital stock) consists of all the shares by which ownership of a corporation or company is divided.Longman Business English Dictionary: "stock - ''especially AmE'' one of the shares into which ownership of a company ...

Shareholder A shareholder (in the United States often referred to as stockholder) of a corporation is an individual or legal entity (such as another corporation, a body politic, a trust or partnership) that is registered by the corporation as the legal own ...

- Shareholders' equity -

South African Institute of Chartered Accountants The South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA), South Africa’s pre-eminent accountancy body, is widely recognised as one of the world’s leading accounting institutes. The institute provides a wide range of support services to m ...

- Sunk cost

T

Three lines of defence Internal auditing is an independent, objective assurance and consulting activity designed to add value and improve an organization's operations. It helps an organization accomplish its objectives by bringing a systematic, disciplined approach to ...

Throughput accounting Throughput accounting (TA) is a principle-based and simplified management accounting approach that provides managers with decision support information for enterprise profitability improvement. TA is relatively new in management accounting. It is a ...

Trade credit Trade credit is the loan extended by one trader to another when the goods and services are bought on credit. Trade credit facilitates the purchase of supplies without immediate payment. Trade credit is commonly used by business organizations as a ...

Treasury stock A treasury stock or reacquired stock is stock which is bought back by the issuing company, reducing the amount of outstanding stock on the open market ("open market" including insiders' holdings). Stock repurchases are used as a tax efficient ...

- Trial balance

U

UK generally accepted accounting principles Generally Accepted Accounting Practice in the UK, or UK GAAP, is the overall body of regulation establishing how company accounts must be prepared in the United Kingdom. Company accounts must also be prepared in accordance with applicable company ...

- Unified Ledger Accounting -

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government, created in the aftermath of the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The primary purpose of the SEC is to enforce the law against market ...

US generally accepted accounting principles Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP or U.S. GAAP, pronounced like "gap") is the accounting standard adopted by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and is the default accounting standard used by companies based in the Uni ...

- Work sheet - Write off

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See also