Usefulness of fair valuation of biological assets for cash flow prediction

Abstract

This study develops an empirical analysis of the relevance of accounting information when biological assets are measured at fair value. We use an international sample of firms with biological assets.We find that biological assets influence unpredictability when they are measured at historical cost (HC). In this case, the ability of accounting data to predict future cash flows diminishes as the proportion of biological assets on total assets increases. The valuation at fair value (FV) switches this negative influence of biological assets to a positive one. We find that when they are measured at FV, the prediction accuracy of future cash flows improves as the ratio of biological assets to total assets increases. This evidence is robust to differentmeasures of prediction accuracy, as well as to the improvement of accounting standards, regardless of FV, over time. The evidence is weaker for bearer plants.