The Balance Sheet I: Assets

The next three chapters consider the two primary financial statements: the balance sheet and the income statement. The balance sheet is considered first. This reflects the primacy given to this statement in the IASB’s Framework, as evidenced by the Framework’s definitions of the elements of the two statements as presented in Exhibit 13.4. These definitions will be examined in more detail later. For the moment, the important point to note is that the definitions of income and expenses (the elements of the income statement) refer to assets and liabilities, but that the latter (the elements of the balance sheet) are defined independently — they do not refer to income and expenses. Income is defined as increases in the value of assets or decreases in the value of liabilities; expenses are negative income. The elements of the income statement are determined by the elements of the balance sheet; the balance sheet is the dominant statement; the income statement is subordinate to it.