Accounting

The SEC released Staff Accounting Bulletin (SAB) no. 107, Share-Based Payment ( www.sec.gov/interps ). Its purpose is to help public companies implement FASB Statement no. 123 (revised 2004), Share-Based Payment ( www.fasb.org/pdf/fas123r.pdf ), which addresses transactions in which entities exchange their equity instruments for goods or services. The SAB does not alter any conclusions in Statement no. 123(R), but rather says that amounts represented in financial statements for stock option expenses are estimates involving considerable judgment. For example, because the grant-date fair value estimate that Statement no. 123(R) requires is not intended to predict the ultimate value realized by an option holder, the staff will not object to reasonable fair value estimates made in good faith in accordance with the statement, even if subsequent events indicate other estimates would have been more accurate.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) published Interpretation no. 47, Accounting for Conditional Asset Retirement Obligations, which clarifies that the term in its title—and used in FASB Statement no. 143, Accounting for Asset Retirement Obligations —describes a legal obligation to perform an asset retirement activity in which the timing and/or method of settlement are conditional on a future event that may not be under the entity’s control. The interpretation is effective no later than the end of fiscal years ending after December 15, 2005 (December 31, 2005, for enterprises reporting on a calendar-year basis). Retrospective application to interim financial information is permitted but not required.