Nedskrivningsprövning av goodwill : En studie av diskonteringsräntor på Nasdaq OMX Stockholm

Sammanfattning: Goodwill accounting has for a long time been, and with the implementation of IFRS in 2005, has become an even bigger issue. Critics mean that reporting of goodwill impairments is subject to discretion that can be used by the managers. We have applied a study made by Carlin and Finch (2009) on Nasdaq OMX Stockholm during 2006-2012. Our study contains 50 of the 255 public companies at 2012-12-31. The purpose of the study is to investigate if companies use an opportunistic discount rate when testing for impairment in goodwill and if the relation between goodwill and net profit before taxes, goodwill intensity, is an incentive for opportunism. This has been done by comparing companies discount rates in the reporting of goodwill impairments with theoretical discount rates estimated through CAPM. This study point out that a majority of the companies discount rates are 150 basis points higher than theoretical discount rates, in most of these cases with more than 250 basis points. We cannot prove that the relation between goodwill and net profit before taxes is an incentive for overrated discount rates and can either confirm or reject that companies are acting opportunistically in estimating discount rates in testing for goodwill impairments. Companies’ systematically overrated discount rates give no proof for earnings management through Big Bath Accounting.