A Study On The Relationship Between Consolidated Financial Statements And The Environmental Factors

Consolidated financial statements have developed for more than one hundred years after it was brought forth by the first wave of business combinations. The way of preparing consolidated financial statements has been influenced by the innovation of business combinations and certain environmental factors ever since. This dissertation tries to find out the thread and the law of development on consolidated financial statements by discussing the relationship between the development of consolidated financial statements and the changes on its environmental factors. It comments on the regulation of preparing consolidated financial statements and its environmental factors in China thereafter. So much so that certain enlightenment could be followed either on the theoretic development or on the accounting practice innovation.Consolidated financial statements developed in the twentieth century and mostly based on the development of business combinations practice and the progress made in accounting field in the United States. The rising of economy in the United States in the twentieth century made it the center of modern accounting. On the other hand, IAS & IFRS are becoming more and more important as a result of accounting standards internationalization. So this dissertation mainly deals with the development of consolidated financial statements under US GAAP and IAS&IFRS with their environmental factors involved.This dissertation divides the way of preparing consolidated financial statements into three parts. There are consolidation policy, general consolidation procedure and the accounting methods for business combinations which is relevant to the preparing of consolidated financial statements. The development of consolidated financial statements is divided into three phases according to the characteristics of development related to each part. Those phases are the phase of conclusion and sum-up from accounting practice, the phase of harmonization and adjustment, the phase of reformation and conformity. Then the dissertation identifies and discusses fiveenvironmental factors related to the development of consolidated financial statements, those factors are financial resources and the development of capital market, accounting profession, accounting education and the research on the accounting theory, political system and accounting regulation, accounting standards internationalization. So that the conclusion on how the environmental factors influenced the development of consolidated financial statements could be reached finally. In the last past of this dissertation the development of consolidated financial statements in China is analyzed and some advices are given on this topic.The main academic contributions of this dissertation are as follows:(1) This dissertation systematically describes the development of consolidated financial statements.(2) This dissertation identifies five environmental factors relevant to the development of consolidated financial statements.(3) The development of consolidated financial statements is divided into three phases so that it provides a new point of view for the study on consolidated financial statements.(4) The discussion on the development of consolidated financial statements in China makes it easier to understand our status quo on the regulation related to consolidated financial statements.