Impact of AASB 16 on Lease Accounting: A Case Study of Wesfarmers

This essay provides a review of the new lease standard AASB 16 and its impact on the financial reporting of Wesfarmers Limited. It discusses the changes in lease accounting under the new standard, the lease arrangements of Wesfarmers, and the short-term and long-term impacts on lease accounting. The essay also explores the lease agreements in the Australian retail sector and the lifecycle and stages affected by AASB 16.

Running head: ADVANCED ISSUED IN ACCOUNTING
Advanced Issued in Accounting
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author’s Note

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Executive Summary
The aim of this essay is to provide the review of the new lease standard AASB 16 along with its impact on various
areas of financial reporting of Wesfarmers Limited. The company will have to report both the lease liabilities and
right-of-use lease assets in the balance sheet along with some additional disclosures under the new lease standard.
These will increase the financial reporting transparency and quality.

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Introduction
The presence of many sources of financing can be seen for the business organizations and Lease Financing
is considered as one of them. Lease is considered as one of the most important source of medium and long-term
financing where the owner of a particular asset provides another person with the right to use that particular asset
against the periodic payments. The presence of two types of leases can be seen; they are Finance Lease and
Operating Lease. Business organizations have the obligation to follow the AASB lease standards for the accounting
of leases in the companies. In Australia, the companies are needed to comply with the principles and standards of
AASB 117 Leases for the purpose of lease accounting. According to the recent development of the Australian
Accounting Standard Board (AASB), there is the introduction of the new accounting standard for lease that is AASB
16 and all the Australian companies are needed to comply with this new lease standard from January 1, 2019 on
mandatory basis. The main aim of this report is the analysis and evaluation of the different aspects of this new lease
standard along with the existing one. This report also considers the analysis of lease accounting in Wesfarmers and
the impact of new lease standard on the financial statements.
Understanding of the Lease Arrangements
Operating vs. Financial Leases
As per the existing lease standard that is AASB 117, Operating Leases and Financial Leases are the two
types of leases; and the standard puts the obligation for the reporting of finance lease assets and liabilities in the
balance sheet. As per AASB 117, it is needed for the companies to disclose information about the operating leases.
The lessor has the asset ownership for the overall lease term in case of operating lease and the asset ownership stays
with the lessee at the end of the lease term in case of finance leases. However, the main reason for the introduction
of AASB 16 is that AASB 117 does not put the obligation on the companies to report the material amounts of
operating leases in the balance sheet (aasb.gov.au, 2018).
Changes in Lease Accounting Under the New Lease Standard
Certain changes are there in AASB 16 as compared to AASB 117, but the lease accounting for lessors will
remain unaltered. However, the lessees will be needed to adopt a single model for lease accounting. All the lease
contracts will be categorized under leases. The lessees will be required to consider the present value of the lease
liabilities along with the right-of-use assets in the balance sheet, but the short-term leases with owe values are the
exception. After that, as per AASB 116 Property, Plant and Equipment and AASB 136 Impairment of Assets, the
right-of-use assets will be depreciated and impaired respectively. In case of lease liabilities, interest would be
recognized as per AASB 140 Investment Property (aasb.gov.au, 2018). It is needed for both lessor and lessee to
adhere to the disclosure objective instead of rigorous checklists under AASB 16. It is needed for the lessees to report
right-of-use assets characteristically in the balance sheet along with the separate note for them. Separate segregation
is needed for depreciation and interest expenses in the profit and loss statement along with the categorization of the

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following payments in the statement of cash flows; they are payment of cash on lease liabilities under financing
activities, payments for short-term and lower leased assets and adherence to the interest payment on lease liabilities
as per AASB107 Statement of Cash Flows for Interest Paid (aasb.gov.au, 2018). These alterations help to enhance
the quality of financial reporting along with ensuring faithful representation of all the financial transactions for the
leases. All these aspects would lead to more transparency in the process of financial reporting.
Overview of Wesfarmers Limited and Their Leases
Wesfarmers is considered as one of the leading conglomerate companies in Australia and the company is
enlisted in Australian Securities Exchange (ASX). The company was established in the year of 1914 and it is
headquartered at Western Australia. Wesfarmers has a diverse business operation that include the supply of home
improvements department stores, office supplies; and the company also has an industrial division that includes the
business of chemicals, fertilizers, energy, safety products and others. It needs to be mentioned that Wesfarmers is the
largest employer of Australia as the current employee base of the company is more than 100,000; and the company
has a shareholder base of approximately 495,000 (wesfarmers.com.au, 2019). The following discussion shows the
information related to the leases of the business of Wesfarmers.
It can be seen from the 2018 Annual Report of Wesfarmers that the company has both the operating leases
and finance lease; and they use certain judgments for the classification of finance and operating leases. The major
lease assets of the company are office, retail and distribution properties, motor vehicles and office equipment.
Wesfarmers classifies the leases based on whether they hold substantially all the risks and rewards related to the
ownership of lease assets or not. It can be seen from the 2018 Annual Report of Wesfarmers that the company does
not have any finance lease in the year 2018 (wesfarmers.com.au, 2019). The details of the operating lease are shown
below:

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(Source: wesfarmers.com.au, 2019)
It can be seen from the above figure that Wesfarmers has the operating lease commitment of $18373
million and $19565 million as lessee for the years 2018 and 2017 respective; and increase in this lease commitment
can be seen in 2018 as compared to 2017. In addition, as lessor, Wesfarmers has lease commitment of $45 million in
2018 and $62 million in 2017.
(Source: wesfarmers.com.au, 2019)
It can also be seen from the above figure that Wesfarmers has minimum lease payments of $2281 million
and $2184 million in the years 2018 and 2017 respectively. In addition, current lease provision of Wesfarmers for
the years 2018 and 2017 is $2 million each; $250 million in 2018 and $233 million in 2017 are the non-current lease
provision of the company (wesfarmers.com.au, 2019).

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Impact of AASB 16 on Wesfarmers
It is mentioned in the 2018 Annual Report of Wesfarmers that the adoption of the new lease standards that
is AASB 16 Leases from 1 January 2019 will have certain material impact on the lease accounting of the company.
As per this new lease standard, it will be the obligation on the company to adopt a single lease model where they
will be needed to recognize assets and liabilities related to all leases. Under AASB 16, Wesfarmers will be required
to show the present value of the lease commitments as liability in the balance sheet; they will also be required to
show the right-of-use assets in the asset side of the balance sheet. The continuing classification in the income
statement will be divided between interest expenses and amortization (Joubert, Garvie & Parle, 2017). It needs to be
mentioned that the aim of Wesfarmers is to implement the modified retrospective transition technique as it will
provide the company with the option on lease-by-lease basis to for the calculation of right-of-use assets as either
equal to the lease liability or on the basis of historical lease payment. This techniques does not have any requirement
of restate comparatives (Wong & Joshi, 2015).
Short-term and Long-term Impacts on Lease Accounting
Impact on Balance Sheet
It needs to be mentioned that the adoption of the new lease standard that is AASB 16 will have impact on
the balance sheet of Wesfarmers due to the fact that the company will be needed to report the lease liabilities and
right-to-use assets in the balance sheet. It can be seen from the earlier discussion that Wesfarmers has $18373
million of operating lease commitment in the year 2018; and they will be needed to include the same in the balance
sheet as lease liability. This aspect will increase the liability position of the company that is not a favorable situation
for the companies (Xu, Davidson & Cheong, 2017). It can also be seen from the earlier discussion that Wesfarmers
has $45 million of lease commitments as lessor that they will be needed to include the balance sheet as right-of-use
assets and this will increase the asset position of the company, but will not make any material difference as lease
liability will be raised in large margin.
Impact on Income Statement
In this context, it also needs to be mentioned that the adoption of the new lease standard that is AASB 16
will create certain impact on the income statement of Wesfarmers in the presence of the fact that the company will
have to consider the interest related to the lease assets and liabilities. On a more precise note, there is a possibility
that there will be increase in the operating income of Wesfarmers due to the fact that the company will have to
report the off balance sheet lease asset’s interests (Giner, Merello & Pardo, 2018). At the same time, it will be
required for the company to report the interest expenses related to the lease liabilities as they will have to show this
expense in the company’s income statement. For this reason, the operating income of the company will be affected
with this.

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Impact of Cash Flows Statement
The above discussion indicates towards the fact that the adoption of the new lease standard that is AASB
16 will have some major impact on both the balance sheet as well as income statement of Wesfarmers. This aspect
also indicates towards the fact that the cash flow statement of the company will be unchanged as the new statement
will not have any impact on the cash flows of the company. However, it needs to be mentioned that it is the decision
of the management of Wesfarmers whether they will recognize the lease payments under the financing activities or
under the investing activities (Tran & Zhu, 2017). For Wesfarmers, it will be preferable to recognize them under the
financing activities due to the nature of lease financing.
Lease Agreements for Australian Retail Sector along with the Lifecycle and Stages
The introduction of AASB 16 will have impact on many Australian business industries like airline industry,
telecommunication industry, mining industry and others; and the companies under Australian retail industry like
Wesfarmers and others will be impacted for the presence of many lease assets and liabilities (Joubert, Garvie &
Parle, 2017).
Figure 1: Impact of AASB 16 on Various Australian Business Industries
(Source: Xu, Davidson & Cheong, 2017)
There are certain effects of AASB 16 on the stage and lifecycles of the Australian retail sector. The first
effect will be on the recognition of lease liabilities and right-of-use assets will increase the amount of lease assets
and liabilities. The next effect will be in the form of increase in EBITDA as there is no operational lease expenses
(Beckman, 2016). There will be rise and decline in the operating cash flow and financing cash flows respectively.

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There will be alteration in financial metrics in the presence of a single lease model affecting dividend policy, debt
agreements, tax, financial leverages and others. Reassessment of specific judgments and estimates related to lease
will make the financial statements volatile. Companies under this industry has to bear implementation and ongoing
costs of the new standard. Rise in the administrative works pressure as AASB 16 requires additional disclosures for
the leases (Dakis, 2016)
Conclusion
It can be seen from the above discussion that the adoption of AASB 16 would have major impacts on
various financial statements of the companies and the companies have to ensure increased disclosure of lease related
aspects under this new lease regulation. It can also be seen that there will be large impact of this new lease standard
on the Australian retail sector. However, the positive is that it would leads to the increased quality of financial
reporting along with the presence of more transparency. Moreover, the companies will have to incur come additional
costs like the implementation and ongoing costs.

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References
Wong, K., & Joshi, M. (2015). The impact of lease capitalisation on financial statements and key ratios: Evidence
from Australia. Australasian Accounting, Business and Finance Journal, 9(3), 27-44.
Joubert, M., Garvie, L., & Parle, G. (2017). Implications of the New Accounting Standard for Leases AASB 16
(IFRS 16) with the Inclusion of Operating Leases in the Balance Sheet. Journal of New Business Ideas &
Trends, 15(2).
Xu, W., Davidson, R. A., & Cheong, C. S. (2017). Converting financial statements: operating to capitalised
leases. Pacific Accounting Review, 29(1), 34-54.
Giner, B., Merello, P., & Pardo, F. (2018). Assessing the impact of operating lease capitalization with dynamic
Monte Carlo simulation. Journal of Business Research.
Tran, A., & Zhu, Y. H. (2017). The impact of adopting IFRS on corporate ETR and book-tax income gap.
Beckman, J. K. (2016). FASB and IASB diverging perspectives on the new lessee accounting: Implications for
international managerial decision-making. International Journal of Managerial Finance, 12(2), 161-176.
Dakis, G. S. (2016). Upcoming changes to contributions and leasing standards. Governance Directions, 68(2), 99.
Joubert, M., Garvie, L., & Parle, G. (2017). Implications of the New Accounting Standard for Leases AASB 16
(IFRS
16) with the Inclusion of Operating Leases in the Balance Sheet. Journal of New Business Ideas & Trends, 15(2),
113-119.
AASB 16. (2018) Leases. Retrieved 29 December 2018, from
https://www.aasb.gov.au/admin/file/content105/c9/AASB16_02-16.pdf
AASB 117. (2018) Leases. Retrieved 29 December 2018, from
https://www.aasb.gov.au/admin/file/content105/c9/AASB117_08-15.pdf
Wesfarmers. (2019). Our businesses. Retrieved 7 January 2019, from https://www.wesfarmers.com.au/our-
businesses/our-businesses
Wesfarmers. (2019). Annual Report 2018. Retrieved 7 January 2019, from
https://www.wesfarmers.com.au/docs/default-source/reports/wes18-044-2018-annual-report.pdf?sfvrsn=4

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