Question

    2. Case Background Introduction:

    The project company is ValueVehicle (VV), which is a hypothetical electrical vehicle manufacturer. VV is a public listed company and is required to comply with all regulations from SEC and GAAP. Your group is the accounting department, and you are responsible for disclosing financial information to the SEC and the public.

    (1) Company necessary financial information

VV (formerly ValueVehicle, Inc.) is an American electric vehicle and clean energy company based in Fayetteville, North Carolina. VV's current products include electric cars (the Model 100, Model 101, and Model 102). VV was founded in July 2008. After 12 years in the market, VV earned its fame as the electric passenger car manufacturer, with a market share of 14% of the plug-in segment and 21% of the battery-electric part.

VV started its IPO in 2012 and became a public company, and it has 2 million outstanding shares. The stock market price is $100 per share on December 1, 2020. The primary financial statues (on December 1, 2020) are illustrated as follows:  

Total assets: $2 billion. Current assets: $50 million (including finished products inventory $30 million). Long-term liability: $50 million.  Current liability: $10 million. Common stock: $10 million (VV has no dilutive shares, bonds, or preferred shares).

The profit goal in 2020 is to earn $10 million net income, which also means that the targeted EPS is $5 per share. By November 30, 2020, VV has achieved $8 million net income (after tax and interest). To achieve the targeted goal, VV needs to have $2 million net income (after tax and interest, the income tax rate is 21%) in December 2020. The transactions of this month are illustrated as follows. Your team is required to record these transactions based on your professional judgment.

   (2) Please recognize the following detailed transactions and complete the journal entries. You need to make the necessary argument if the journal entries have several options.

   A. From December 1 through December 20, VV has had 1.2 million dollars transactions with a gross margin of 40%.

   B. Dealer X planned to sign a $1 million sales contract with VV in February 2021 (the gross margin is projected as 40% based on the current product information). Recently, dealer X discussed an alternative that they can sign the contract before December 31, 2020. The condition is that VV can offer a 20% discount on the sales price. VV can choose to provide the discount in December 2020, reject this contract, and wait for the deal in February 2021.

   C. Dealer Y proposed to sign a $1 million sales contract with VV before December 31, 2020, with two conditions: (1) Dealer Y can return the cars unconditionally if they cannot sell the cars before June 2021. (2) VV needs to offer a 10% discount on the sales price. The gross margin is projected as 40% based on the current product price (without the 10% discount). There is no publicly available information about how many cars Dealer Y can sell by June 2021. The representative of dealer Y predicts 10% of the cars cannot be sold by June 2021. VV can choose to offer the contract or reject this deal.

   D. On December 1, 2020, the accounting department receives the latest report from the Pilot Automation System department. The report claims that a new wireless operating system had achieved technological feasibility. VV has spent $800,000 on this system in 2020. The technological feasibility judgment is based on the company's own engineer expert group. There is no official technical criterion currently available for technological feasibility. The original goal for this Pilot Automation System is a patent, but the management now considering this system as internally developed software. VV spends $300,000 this month after passing the technological feasibility. Based on this condition, you are required to judge whether this system is a patent or software and decide to capitalize the $300,000 (the capitalization can be amortized within ten years) or record as an R&D expense.

   E. On December 10, you checked and found that VV had four debt investments in the market. The category and the fair value are listed as follows:

Company  Amount  MarketingValue (12/10/20)  Category     MaturityDate

AA       $1 million   $1.2 million        Held-to-maturity    June 2022

BB       $1 million   $1.3 million        Held-to-maturity    June 2022

CC       $1 million   $0.8 million        Trading security     July 2022

DD     $1 million   $0.9 million   Available-for-sale security  May 2022

  The CEO suggests re-categorize these investments and recognize some of the gains and losses. Please claim your decisions and explain the reasons for your argument.    

   F. VV bought $20 million in equity securities from JJ Company. The investment is 19% of the voting common stock of JJ Company, but the CFO is selected from VV. VV has some impacts on JJ Company’s decision-making. VV uses an equity approach to record this investment. The balance of the JJ investment in December 2020 is $20 million. Some managers argue that the impact is not significant and want to change the accounting approach to use fair value and recognize the investment gains. JJ Company has zero net income in 2020, but JJ’s stock price has increased to $21.4 million. Do you agree with the change and recognize the $1.4 million gains? Please clarify your reasons for your judgment.  

   G. On December 22, the accounting team is required to make a financing decision for the 2021 annual budget. VV has a $5 million budget shortage that needs financing. You have three options available for the demanding $5 million. First, VV can borrow the money from a local bank with a 12% annual interest. Second, sell $5 million treasury stocks. Third, initiate $5 million non-participatory preferred stocks with a 12% dividend ratio. Please select one option and clarify your reasons.

   H. VV decides to initiate a one million dollars stock-based compensatory plan for the C-level managers. Your team is required to make a selection from two alternatives: the first is to use compensatory stock options; the second is to use a restricted stock plan. What is your preference, and explain why you choose your selection?

    I. The administrative and selling expense in December 2020 is $300,000. Please include the eight businesses above and compute your net income and EPS. Remember to pay income tax for December income (tax rate is 21%).  

J. If your net income from the computation above is less than $2 million, you cannot meet the market expectation. You are required to explore possible solutions to help achieve this goal. Please propose one potential accounting-related business activity to meet your goal. The proposed solution needs to comply with the official regulations from GAAP, SEC, etc. Please explain your proposed transaction and present the journal entry for your transaction.

Here is a hinted example. One financial consultant advises you to sell one building to your business partners. Then you can lease back to use the following three years. The building's original value is $3 million, and the current value is $2 million (the depreciation is $1 million). The fair value of the fixed assets is $2.9 million. The lease can be operating lease for three years, and each year from 2021 is $0.3 million. The sale can add $0.9 million gains for 2020 annual net income. The journal entry is:      

            Dr: Sales                    2.9 m

              Accumulated depreciation      1 m

                  Cr: Fixed asset-building        3 m

                   Gains of fixed asset sales      0.9m  

Answer 1

1. Features of Section 80EEB

a) Eligibility criteria

The deduction under this section is available only to individuals. This deduction is not available to any other taxpayer. Thus, if you are a HUF, AOP, Partnership firm, a company, or any other kind of taxpayer, you cannot claim any benefit under this section.

b) Amount of deduction

A deduction for interest payments up to Rs 1,50,000 is available under Section 80EEB. An individual taxpayer may have an electric vehicle for personal use or for business use. This deduction would facilitate individuals having an electric vehicle for personal use to claim the interest paid on the vehicle loan.

In case of business use, an individual can also claim the deduction up to Rs 1,50,000 under section 80EEB. Any interest payments above Rs 1,50,000 can be claimed as a business expense. To claim as a business expense, it is necessary that the vehicle should be registered in the name of the owner or the business enterprise.

Do note that an individual taxpayer should obtain the interest paid certificate and keep the necessary documents such as tax invoice and loan documents handy at the time of filing of the return.

2. Conditions for claiming the deduction

• The loan must be taken from a financial institution or a non-banking financial company for buying an electric vehicle.
• The loan must be sanctioned anytime during the period starting from 1 April 2019 till 31 March 2023.
• “Electric vehicle” has been defined to mean a vehicle which is powered exclusively by an electric motor whose traction energy is supplied exclusively by traction battery installed in the vehicle and has such electric regenerative braking system, which during braking provides for the conversion of vehicle kinetic energy into electrical energy.

3. Promotion of electric vehicle mobility solution

The union cabinet has approved Phase-II of FAME scheme for promotion of electric mobility in the country. The FAME (Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Electric Vehicles) is an incentive scheme of the government of India for the promotion of electric and hybrid vehicles in the country. The ultimate objective of the scheme is to promote electric mobility and the scheme offers financial incentives for the purchase of electric vehicles and the creation of electric transportation and charging infrastructure. Under the scheme, the incentives are available for 3 Wheelers, 4 Wheelers and electric 2 wheelers.

The Phase-II of the scheme has started from 1 April 2019 and will be completed by 31 March 2022. The Phase-II is an expanded version of the first phase. FAME India Phase II has a total outlay of Rs 10000 Crores over a period of 3 years from 1 April 2019 to 31 March 2022.