淺析澳大利亞公允價值及應用

摘要：本文闡述了公允價值在為經濟決策提供有用信息中所扮演的角色，以及公允價值的五個缺陷，并分析了澳大利亞兩家不同行業的企業對公允價值的應用。

關鍵詞：公允價值 澳大利亞企業 應用

Abstract：This essay stated the role of fair value accounting in providing useful information for making economic decisions. And then it discussed the limitations of fair value accounting. Finally， the essay analyzed the applications for fair value in two Australia companies which were in different industries.

Keywords: Fair value accounting Australia companies Applications

In the year of 2008， a series of financial institutions was on the verge of bankruptcy， even suffered acquisition. This made financial community give strongly oppugns in the application to fair value accounting. American Bankers Association even required stopping using fair value as a measurement instrument. Therefore， fair value accounting faces an acid test after American financial crisis. Some people think fair value accounting is the root cause and has aggravated for financial crisis. They strongly recommend modifying or stopping using fair value. Relatively， some are against that fair value accounting just represents the market fluctuation information it captures. Fair value only has the amplified action for financial crisis. Although it is stopped in use， it cannot solve the problems of financial crisis itself. Thus it can be seen the application of fair value accounting has become the focus for the whole world.

Fair value has two authoritative definitions. Financial Accounting Standards Board thinks that fair value is the amount that the two willing parties purchase or sell one asset or liability in the current transaction (FASB， 2000). International Accounting Standards Board regards fair value as the amount that parties who are familiar with situation are willing to exchange assets or liabilities in true and fair transaction (IASB， 1998).

Fair value accounting provides more transparency than historical cost based measurements. The western experts deem it has stronger relevance and information transparency. It also can provide more useful information for investors to make economic decisions. Thus， fair value accounting is gradually accepted by people and is application for financial instruments， long-term assets and liabilities measurement. In the year of 2006， FASB statement 157 Fair value measurements put forward the general framework with the measurement and disclosure of assets and liabilities fair value， and the model for measuring the assets and liabilities by fair value (Ge Jiashu， 2006).

As it is shown on the research， fair value accounting has some limitations as a financial instrument. The first limitation is fair value measurement causes the fluctuation of carry amount and it magnifies crisis. Fair value requires measurement based on the market value which means the business should recognize the carry amounts of related assets and liabilities in its Balance Sheet (Chen Min， 2005). When the market changes frequently， the fluctuations of business financial status and profitability will change. In the period of economic bubble， business’s Balance Sheet increases and incremental return is increased in the Income Statement. This incremental return might not have related cash flow， but the financial data makes the business easily to use the expansion strategies. Whereas， in the financial crisis period， due to dramatic devaluation of holding shares， funds and other assets， entering the account based on market price brings numerous loss. The business is difficult to finance so it only has to undersell financial assets which will lead to the price fall， assets impairment and loss vicious circle again.

The second limitation is unfair and untrue under inactive and irrational market circumstance. Due to the deficiency of error treatment functions， transaction values may have a large difference from assets’ real values. The guidelines for fair value measurement from American SEC test and verify this opinion at the reverse side (Yu Yongsheng， 2005). These guidelines require if the assets lacks of active public market transaction when the businesses recognize the assets’ fair values， the businesses can use internal pricing including rational subjective judgment to define the fair value.

Then， the third limitation is the problem of reliable measurement. Currently， the market system is not perfect， and the asset’ fair value is hard to get under some instances. In the process of specific standards application， using future cash flow and discount rate to ensure the information that the similar information cannot be found. By using this method with large amount of estimations and human judgments can gain the more strongly subjective fair value.

Additionally， the operation is another limitation. Accounting standards require the business accountants to take an initial and subsequent measurement for the fair value of assets and liabilities. Under the special background of financial crisis， market environment is more uncertain， especially in the aspects of a variety of financial derivatives and rapid price changes. It not only expands the elasticity space for fair value measurement， it also increases the difficulties for business accountants to acquire fair value. For the financial instruments which have no related market price， it should be measured by using the present value which is calculated by discounting future cash flows. However， the amount of future cash flow， time and monetary time value are all uncertainty so that it only can be estimated to recognize.

The last limitation for fair value accounting is earning management. Although fair value and earning management have not direct relationship， earning management obviously appears under the separation system of rights between management and ownership. In accordance with statistics， the listed companies which have implemented new accounting standards have a different increase degree in their investment returns. Through the analysis， it has found most parts of returns in the listed companies are from fair value adjustment for cross-shareholding.

Telstra is the biggest telecom company in Australia and it is the only one nationalized business of Australia. In October of the year 1997， Australia government began selling 49.9% share rights to the institution investors and individual investors. Government carried out partly privatization to Telstra， but it still held 50.1% shares. Telstra is one of the best profitability companies in the world， and it is also the most advanced telecom operators. The business in Telstra includes wire communication， ADSL， HFC， satellites， CDMA and GSM digital mobile network. Meanwhile， Telstra is also the advanced ISP in Australia. Its market capital is ranked NO.11 in the world telecom industry. In the rank of world biggest companies， Telstra ranks No.49. It is the listed company in Australia. New Zealand and New York share market. Relating to assets pricing， Telstra firstly uses market value which can ensure whether the market exists the comparable similar assets value in the transaction. If the market does not exist， Telstra uses estimate measurement which uses the assets cost vale. The application for fair value in Telstra non-monetary transaction， it depends on the exchange principles. The principles are the exchange whether has the business substance. When considering the substance， the company pays more attention to the relationship among transaction parties (Geoff Rankin， 2006).

BHP Billiton Ltd. – Broken Hill Proprietary Billiton Ltd is a famous multinational corporation in the world. It lives by operating oils and minerals. BHP was established in Melbourne in 1885， and Billiton was in 1860. In the June of 2001， BHP and Billiton consolidated. In the 2003-2004 financial year， the total revenue in the corporation was 34.087 billion Australian dollars and its market value was 136.35 billion Australian dollars. BHP Billiton Ltd. is the second largest global coal and mine group company， and it has listed in Australia， London and New York share exchange (Jock， 2010). Currently， it is the third global iron mine supplier. In the financial statement of BHP Billiton， when the bauxite from assets weipa transferred to alumina factory under the same legal entity， it was measured by produce costs. After this transaction， the related company revenue allocated from weipa’s all sales was measured by fair value accounting (Guo Fenglin， 2006). Assumption that this transaction occurred on January 1st 2009， used fair value to measure the transaction with related parties， the EBITDA of weipa would increase 7.2 million US dollars and yarwun would decrease 3.6 million US dollars.

In conclusion， public have different acknowledge in fair value accounting， so the fair value exists a variety of representations. When the perfect market and fair transaction are not applied， measurement cannot provide useful information for decision making. Therefore， the imperfect market limits the measurement of fair value and fair value currently is still an irreplaceable method in measuring assets value. Its internal scientificity should not be denied.

Reference List :

[1]Chen Min， 2005， ‘Nature of Fair Value and Theory Limitation’， Finance and Accounting Monthly， May 2005， pp. 17-19.

[2]Ge Jiashu， 2006， ‘Discussion in Accounting Measures’， Accounting Research， August 2006， pp. 3-6.

[3]Geoff Rankin， 2006， Application for Fair Value， Finance Accounting， viewed at May 9th 2012.

[4]Guo Fenglin， 2006， ‘Fair Value Accounting’， Science Technology Information， March 2006， pp. 21-23.

[5]Jock， March 15th 2010， BHP Billiton Ltd.， Baidu Baike， viewed at May 8th， 2012.

[6]Yu Yongsheng， 2005， ‘American Fair Value Applications and Research’， Finance and Economy Forum， September 2005， pp. 25-26.

作者簡介：蔡曉琳（1987年9月-），女，漢族，畢業學校：中國礦業大學（北京），學歷：研究生在讀，研究方向：財務會計。