[kszxgz]

"Hate when companies not doing well try to dodge by blasting 'traditional accounting rules' when these rules have been crafted over the years to accurately reflect the value of said company."

I agree that criticism of traditional accounting methods often points to inherent risks and even corruption, see Enron.

However, as I understand it, measuring firm value is not the primary goal of accounting. The way depreciation is calculated, for instance, may be convenient for other reasons, but it doesn't say much about real values at all. Accounting numbers are quite artificial.

When analysts calculate firm values, through methods like DCF, they use accounting numbers from the financial statements as their inputs to calculate cash flow etc., but that's just for lack of a better alternative. In fact the numbers don't make sense by themselves and many of the accounting rules just make the estimation of firm values more difficult.

[varjag]

> Accounting numbers are quite artificial.

At least three of these accounting numbers are very real: revenue, expenses and assets. When the dust from handwaving settles, they ultimately describe the health of a company any given fiscal quarter. Observing their first derivative values would typically show the direction the business is heading. It's this information that the crude corporate PID controllers (aka board meetings) use to steer the enterprise.

Look at the immense scepticism Tesla is met with based on operational stats, despite having actual, in-demand market product. Talk is cheap and accounting has been a great performance predictor many times over.

[YokoZar]

Almost all of Intellectual Ventures assets are patents with unclear value. Maybe they can use them to extract millions of dollars of settlements. Or maybe they're worthless.

When that's the majority of your balance sheet, whatever method you chose will have legitimate criticism.

[varjag]

And maybe my $20 pickaxe can be used to mine gold nuggets?

They can be valued with at least their acquisition value, which is a start. For all we know the "true" value (come liquidation) may now be zero, but still it puts a practical cap to how much IV can hype its business model.