Research On The Manipulation Of Goodwill Impairment Timing

Since 2014,China’s M&A market activity has seen explosive growth,high premium M&A is common,goodwill "bubble" continues to increase,and the risk of impairment is increasingly prominent.With the frequent "thunder" of goodwill in China’s capital market,listed companies backlog goodwill and concentrated release of impairment risk and other phenomena emerge one after another,causing regulatory departments to focus on the rationality of goodwill impairment point.Hence,the main purpose of this study is to examine whether there is any problem with manipulating goodwill impairment time points.This study mainly uses literature analysis and case analysis.Firstly,the literature review is carried out on the methods of goodwill impairment treatment,the problems existing in the impairment test method,the reasons for the provision of goodwill impairment,and the prevention of goodwill impairment risks.Based on this,the theoretical basis of this study is summarized.Secondly,this study selected the goodwill impairment time point whose rationality has been questioned as the case study object,and confirmed the existence of goodwill impairment time point manipulation from the two perspectives of goodwill impairment test and the specific analysis of goodwill impairment of the acquired object.It is found that the main problem of goodwill impairment time point manipulation is that goodwill impairment does not conform to the economic essence,which is mainly reflected in three aspects: not making provision when goodwill impairment should be made,less making provision when goodwill impairment should be made,and still making provision when goodwill impairment should not be made.Further analysis shows that the main reasons for the manipulation of the time point of goodwill impairment are that the valuation premium of M&A may be too high,the subjective manipulation space of goodwill impairment test is large,and there is earnings management motivation.Finally,this study puts forward targeted prevention suggestions from the three perspectives of enterprises themselves,the perfection of standards and the supervision of third-party intermediaries.The application value of this study lies in: one is to provide a new perspective for related research;Second,it is helpful for statement users to identify the goodwill impairment manipulation of listed companies and improve the usefulness of accounting information;Third,it will help to enhance the pertinence of supervision.