Question

In your own words, how would you define accounting? What is its purpose, and why is it important?

Explain the differences between managerial accounting and financial accounting.

What is an income statement, a balance sheet, and the statement of owner’s equity?

Explain what the accounting equation is and how it works.

Why is it not a good idea to falsify financial statements?

Read the case study below and answer the questions that follow:

Counting Earnings before They Hatch: You recently ran into one of your former high school teachers. You were surprised to learn that he’d left teaching, gone back to school, and, a little more than a year ago, started a business that creates Web sites for small companies. It so happens that he needs a loan to expand his business, and the bank wants financial statements. When he found out that you were studying accounting, he asked whether you’d look over a set of statements that he’d just prepared for his first year in business. Because you’re anxious to show off your accounting aptitude, you agreed.

First, he showed you his income statement. It looked fine: revenues (from designing Web sites) were $94,000, expenses were $86,000, and net income was $8,000. When you observed how unusual it was that he’d earned a profit in his first year, he seemed a little uneasy.

“Well,” he confessed, “I fudged a little when I prepared the statements. Otherwise, I’d never get the loan.”

He admitted that $10,000 of the fees shown on the income statement was for work he’d recently started doing for a client (who happened to be in big trouble with the IRS). “It isn’t like I won’t be earning the money,” he explained. “I’m just counting it a little early. It was easy to do. I just added $10,000 to my revenues and recorded an accounts receivable for the same amount.”

You quickly did the math: without the $10,000 payment for the client in question, his profit of $8,000 would become a loss of $2,000 (revenues of $84,000 less expenses of $86,000).

As your former teacher turned to get his balance sheet, you realized that, as his accountant, you had to decide what you’d advise him to do. The decision is troublesome because you agree that if he changes the income statement to reflect the real situation, he won’t get the bank loan.

What did you decide to do, and why?

Assuming that he doesn’t change the income statement, will his balance sheet be incorrect? How about his statement of cash flows? What will happen to next year’s income: will it be higher or lower than it should be?

What would happen to your former teacher if he gave the bank the fraudulent financial statements and the bank discovered the truth? How could the bank learn the truth?

Answer 1

1. in my own word accounting means a systematic way of keeping daily financial records.the main purpose of accounting is that it remainds us that what is the current financial situation of mine.it is important because it helps us to record,summarize,classify our financial data.

2. the main difference between managerial and financial accounting is that managerial accounting deals with the management side of the business or organization whereas financial accounting deals with the financial side of the business which involves the stakeholder, investors,etc

3. income statement or profit and loss statement means that it shows the revenue and expenses of a particular period of the company/business. Balance sheet means it shows the total usage of assets and liabilities of the company. In my own word the simple understanding of owner's equity can be said by the following formula which is owner's equity = assets-liabilities.

4. Accounting equation means the one side of the balance sheet is liabilities and owner equity should be equal to the other side of the table which is assets and it can be calculated by the following formula, Assets= Liabilities+Owner's equity.

5. yes, it is not good to falsify the financial statements because than the investor which are investing to our business will felt cheated and they may bear losses in near future. It is a fraud and we should never do such sort of illegal activity from which our investor may suffer.

6. I decide to not help him because a fraud is a fraud whether he is my teacher or my relatives, i will try to convince him to not do any sort of fraud because if one time he get successful than again he would try to do a fraud in the coming future. so, i will not support him

Yes, his balance sheet will be incorrect because he added the next financial year money to the previous financial year to get loan from the bank. cashflow will get affected because he should now show his receipts of 10000 fees in the cash flow statement of the previous year statement and he cannot add that fees to the next year statement. His next year income will be lower because he has already added his fees to the previous year.

If the bank discovered the truth than he will get the punishment what every fraudulent client gets, and it also depends on the bank rules and regulations. The bank could learn the truth by studying each and every financial statement clearly and by checking the cash flows of the client and also the profit which the client is showing in the paper is there in his bank account or not.