Goodwill Accounting - An Examination of its Impacts on Mergers and Aquisition Decisions

Abstract

Over the past years, the FASB and the IASB have made sweeping changes in the accounting for goodwill and other intangible assets. In 2001 the FASB issued SFAS 141, “Business Combinations” and SFAS 142, ‘Goodwill and other Intangible Assets’. Concurrently, the IASB issued IFRS 3 “Business Combinations’’ and IAS 36 “Impairment of Assets’’ in 2004. IFRS 3 like SFAS 141 prohibited the pooling of interest method for the purchase method of accounting to record acquisitions. IAS 36 had the same resolution like SFAS 142, eliminating the amortization method and endorsing an impairment testing approach. These pronouncements are having a dramatic impact on financial statement information relating to M&A and their related goodwill.The purpose of this study is to find out if and how the new goodwill accounting treatment will affect M&A decisions in some selected Swedish companies.To meet this objective, an in-depth study was carried out with interviews conducted with some personnel of the companies. The result shows that, beyond the traditional reasons for M&A, these new rules will certainly affect some companies M&A decisions. The argument here largely depends on the goodwill amount on the statement of financial position and it effects on EPS.