Broker's Open House

Finance a la shmoop what is FASB? ok first say it with me people FASB sounds

way cooler than Financial Accounting Standards Board alright well what is it

well it's a private regulatory body that has given birth to myriad opinions on [FASB definition appears on 100 dollar bill]

how things should be accounted for with its favorite child being GAAP.....

yeah, remember GAAP generally accepted accounting principles and it's the

religion of accounting so GAAP was the most famous creation of FASB, but

hundreds of other little creations followed in that the august group of

seven members who run FASB realized 50 years ago that the world would look a

whole lot different half a century later when you were countin beans like who'd have

thunk about digital beans accounting standards would have to be flexible [People stretching in a field]

almost in the same vague way the US Constitution is written so that when a

customer buys an upgrade from the people who make angry birds in an app sold by

Apple but downloaded by Comcast paid for with a Visa card while everyone would

know with certainty who got paid what when the key idea behind FASB is that

it's an adaptive group that changes with a quickly changing bean-counting

environment trying to make sure everything is you know fair and square

for all if you want to think about it in a mathy way well they seek to be the

derivative not the curve itself alright so you're living right here on the curve [Arrow points to derivative on a curve]

changing all the time dxdy and all that crap, FASB....