Niklas Sandell

The Language of Failure: The Use of Accounts in Financial Reports

The natural language that accompanies the accounting language in financial reports is not only a more or less accurate representation of the company but also, the authors argue, a response to explicit as well as implicit external demands, expectations, and accusations. Drawing on the notion of accounts (i.e., statements or responses that neutralize critique of not meeting expectations), the authors analyze the natural language in financial reports. In analyzing financial reports with the use of account theory, both individual actions and structurally anchored financial report discourse are approached. The theory of accounts helps the authors discern the fine-grained anatomy of financial reports by means of which impressions are managed, legitimacy is upheld, and the dialogue between companies and their public is maintained. The analysis demonstrates the presence of five types of accounts in the financial reports: excuse, justification, refocusing, concession, and mystification. Financial reporting is a legally and culturally regulated genre of business communication that partakes in the ongoing conversation between a company and its public. Understanding the role of accounts is needed to enhance the genre awareness and reader competence among the readers of financial reports.

Writing write-downs : the rhetoric of goodwill impairment

Purpose - The aim of this paper is to study the rhetoric of goodwill impairment, more specifically rhetoric, as it is constructed in the form of accounts (i.e. statements that explain unanticipated or untoward behavior). The authors argue that goodwill impairment is not only a technical matter but also a rhetorical practice by means of which external scrutiny is responded to. Design/methodology/approach - The data corpus consists of explanations provided by corporations regarding impairment of goodwill. Data were collected from annual reports from companies quoted on NASDAQ OMX Stockholm, Sweden. The impairment explanations were analyzed according to a taxonomy of account types. The explanations were subjected to close reading to discern the potential rhetorical functions of the different accounts. Findings - Seven account types are identified and discussed, namely, excuse, justification, refocusing, concession, mystification, silence and wordification. Research limitations/implications - There is a need for further research that explores the process of authorship (i.e. writing, editing, negotiating and revising) through which the texts of financial communication are produced. Practical implications - The findings have implications for the future formulations of standards regarding qualitative explanations in financial reporting in general and explanations of goodwill impairment in particular. Originality/value - The paper contributes to the knowledge about the use of natural language and rhetoric in financial communication.

Tax Planning in Partner-owned Close Corporations

Over thepast years, the scholarly discussionon tax lawhas focused largely on aggressive tax planning (Dourado 2015; Panayi 2015). “Aggressive tax planning” is not a legal term; it refers primarily to transactions whereby companies take advantage of discrepancies—arbitrage—between tax laws of different countries, thereby achieving a more favorable taxation than the comparable taxpayers who have no access to such tax-planning opportunities. Aggressive tax planning, then, is not a matter of evading the law, but of exploiting, for purposes of personal gain, the limitations and shortcomings of the lawwith regard to certain transactions. Or, asMurphy (2005) defines it: “Aggressive taxplanning by its very nature involves findingways to accomplish compliance with the letter of the law while totally undermining the policy intent or spirit behind the legislation” (p. 563). Tax planning, whereby tax arbitrages are exploited for personal gain, is not merely an issue within international taxation, however, it can also occur in domestic transactions. Differences in tax rates for different types of income