Field notes · 21 January 2026

Reading a consolidation where the numbers hide

A consolidation workbook can foot and still hide the group. The usual hiding places are ordinary. Intercompany that almost meets, and is forced to meet with a plug. A subsidiary whose local reporting date is a month adrift, so inventory and a payable belong to different weeks. Non-controlling interest calculated on a number that has already been adjusted for a parent-only reserve. Translation of a trading company whose currency moved more than its volume.

None of these require a lecture on the standard. They require a map. Put the entities on a page in the order they feed the parent. Draw the elimination as a line, not as a journal the committee will never open. If a balance is unmatched, leave a gap. A gap is information. A rounded zero that everyone in the reporting team knows is a wish is not.

Georgian parents with companies in neighbouring markets see this every December. The sitting in Tbilisi is often asked to approve a pack whose last tab was finished on the drive in. If that tab is the Armenian or Azerbaijani trading company, say so on the map. Directors cannot oversee a close they are not told is still moving.

What we refuse to do is decorate the plug. If the plug exists, it is a line with a name. The committee may still sign. They should not sign believing the eliminations were clean.