Fictitious assets are not actually assets. They are expenses/losses not written off in the year in which they are incurred. They do not have any physical presence. Their expense is spread over more than one accounting period. A part of the expense is amortized/written off every year against the compRead more
Fictitious assets are not actually assets. They are expenses/losses not written off in the year in which they are incurred. They do not have any physical presence. Their expense is spread over more than one accounting period.
A part of the expense is amortized/written off every year against the company’s earnings. The remaining part (which is yet to be written off) is shown as an asset in the balance sheet. They are shown as assets because these expenses are expected to give returns to the company over a period of time.
Here are some examples of fictitious assets:
- Preliminary expenses.
- Promotional expenses.
- Loss incurred on the issue of debentures.
- Underwriting commission.
- Discount on issue of shares.
To make it simple I’ll explain the accounting treatment of preliminary expenses with an example.
The promoters of KL Ltd. paid 50,000 as consultation fees for incorporating the company. The consultation fee is a preliminary expense as they are incurred for the formation of the company. The company agreed to write off this expense over a period of 5 years.
At the end of every year, the company will write off 10,000 (50,000/5) as an expense in the Profit & Loss A/c.
The remaining portion i.e. 40,000 (50,000 – 10,000) will be shown on the Assets side of the Balance Sheet under the head Non – Current Assets and sub-head Other Non – Current Assets.Â
Here are the financial statements of KL Ltd.,


Note: As per AS 26 preliminary expenses are fully written off in the year they are incurred. This is because such expenses do not meet the definition of assets and must be written off in the year of incurring.
Source: Some fictitious assets examples are from Accountingcapital.com & others from Wikipedia.
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The commercial banks are required to keep a certain amount of their deposits with the central bank and the percentage of deposits that the banks are required to keep as reserves is called Cash Reserve Ratio. The banks have to keep the amount to maintain the Cash Reserve Ratio with the RBI. CRR meansRead more
The commercial banks are required to keep a certain amount of their deposits with the central bank and the percentage of deposits that the banks are required to keep as reserves is called Cash Reserve Ratio.
The banks have to keep the amount to maintain the Cash Reserve Ratio with the RBI.
CRR means that commercial banks cannot lend money in the market or make investments or earn any interest on the amount below what is required to be kept in CRR.
RBI mandates Cash Reserve Ratio so that a percentage of the bank’s deposit is kept safe with the RBI, hence, in an uncertain event bank can still fulfill its obligation against its customers.
CRR also helps RBI to control liquidity in the economy. When CRR is kept at a higher rate, the lower the liquidity in the economy, and similarly when CRR is kept at a lower rate, there is higher liquidity in the economy.
The Reserve Bank of India also regulates inflation through the Cash Reserve Ratio:
The formula for CRR is-Â
Reserves maintained with Central Banks / Bank Deposits * 100%
For example:
The current CRR is 3% which means that for every Rs 100 deposit in the commercial banks have to keep Rs 3 as a deposit with RBI.
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