Enhanced Business Reporting

Public dissatisfaction with the mismatch between industrial rules of disclosure and post-industrial realities has surged in the last decade and a half, especially recently in the wake of well-publicized corporate swindles. In response, the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) convened a special committee on enhanced business reporting (EBR), asking it to develop a strategy that would “make better information available to investors, creditors … [ Read more ]

A New Paradigm for Managing Shareholder Value

A staggering proportion of enterprise value does not depend on current operations, but rather on expectations concerning growth opportunities-what Accenture calls future value. Much of that future value depends, in turn, not on the resources (assets) that traditional accounting practice handles well-i.e. the monetary and physical assets-but on the resources it hardly handles at all-such as, intangible and intellectual capital. Many of the most successful … [ Read more ]

New Concepts in Value-Based Management: TRS Mapping and Total Economic Profit

Most company executives have an explicit goal for increasing returns to their shareholders. However, while many companies focus on current operations metrics, such as earnings per share, net income, and economic profit, these often only have a modest impact on shareholder value. This research note introduces several new concepts to help executives in achieving their ultimate objective of increasing shareholder return, including the Accenture Total … [ Read more ]

Future Value: The $7 Trillion Challenge

Nearly 60 percent of the aggregate value of the US stock market is based on investor expectations of future growth. And because this future value tends to be concentrated in industries and companies that are built on intangible assets, it is critical to find better ways to recognize, report and manage these assets.