FASB lease guidance is effective in 2019 but early adoption is permitted. Are there any companies considering early adoption?
Here at SECI, the only early adopter that we know about so far is Microsoft. They plan to early adopt on July 1, 2017 as their fiscal year ends June 30, 2017.
This is from their March 31, 2017 quarterly report on Form 10-Q:
Leases
In February 2016, the FASB issued a new standard related to leases to increase transparency and comparability among organizations by requiring the recognition of right-of-use (“ROU”) assets and lease liabilities on the balance sheet. Most prominent among the changes in the standard is the recognition of ROU assets and lease liabilities by lessees for those leases classified as operating leases under current U.S. GAAP. Under the standard, disclosures are required to meet the objective of enabling users of financial statements to assess the amount, timing, and uncertainty of cash flows arising from leases. We will be required to recognize and measure leases existing at, or entered into after, the beginning of the earliest comparative period presented using a modified retrospective approach, with certain practical expedients available.
The standard will be effective for us beginning July 1, 2019, with early adoption permitted. We plan to adopt the standard effective July 1, 2017 concurrent with our adoption of the new standard related to revenue recognition. We intend to elect the available practical expedients on adoption. While our ability to early adopt depends on system readiness, including software procured from third-party providers, and completing our analysis of information necessary to restate prior period consolidated financial statements, we remain on schedule and have implemented key system functionality to enable the preparation of restated financial information.
We anticipate this standard will have a material impact on our consolidated balance sheets. However, we do not expect adoption will have a material impact on our consolidated income statements. While we are continuing to assess potential impacts of the standard, we currently expect the most significant impact will be the recognition of ROU assets and lease liabilities for operating leases. We expect our accounting for capital leases to remain substantially unchanged.
We are nearing completion of retrospectively adjusting financial information for fiscal year 2016 and are progressing as planned for fiscal year 2017. We expect adoption of the standard will result in the recognition of additional ROU assets and lease liabilities for operating leases of approximately $5 billion as of June 30, 2016. ROU assets and lease liabilities for operating leases are expected to increase in fiscal year 2017 primarily due to the acquisition of LinkedIn Corporation (“LinkedIn”) and additional datacenter leases.
SECI is holding a live interactive workshop on Lease Accounting in New York and San Francisco. Join us to hear more about how to implement the new standard!
Implementing the FASB’s New Lease Accounting Standard Workshop being held September 8th & November 3rd in New York City and October 16th in San Francisco. Attendees will learn the conceptual underpinnings, overall structure and details of this new standard as it applies to both lessees and lessors. Implementation considerations, system issues and related topics will be discussed in detail and concepts will be reinforced by use of examples and case studies.