An updated guide to accounting for debt modifications and restructurings

An updated edition of RSM’s Guide to accounting for debt modifications and restructuringsis now available. The guide primarily focuses on subtopics 470-50 and 470-60 of the Financial Accounting Standards Board’s (FASB) Accounting Standards Codification (ASC) Topic 470, Debt.

This edition reflects recent FASB standard-setting activity and enhancements to RSM’s interpretive guidance and illustrative examples based on issues we are seeing in practice. The following list highlights some of the more significant topics added, expanded upon, or otherwise updated in the guide:

• Issuance by the FASB of Accounting Standards Update 2024-04, Debt – Debt with Conversion and Other Options (Subtopic 470-20): Induced Conversions of Convertible Debt Instruments
• Discussion of the FASB’s technical agenda project, Accounting for Debt Exchanges
• Discussion of practice issues, such as how a lender’s equity investment in the borrower may impact gain recognition in certain transactions and unit of account considerations when there are multiple term loans with the same lender

A summary of all significant changes can be found in Appendix C of the guide.