PBO? Pension expense?

Andrew Carson is an equity analyst employed at Lee, Vincent, and Associates, an investment research firm. In a conversation with his supervisor, Daniel Lau, Carson makes the following two statements about defined contribution plans.

Statement 1: Employers often face onerous disclosure requirements.

Statement 2: Employers often bear all the investment risk.

Carson is responsible for following Samilski Enterprises (Samilski), a publicly traded firm that produces motorcycles and other mechanical parts. It operates exclusively in the United States. At the end of its 2009 fiscal year, Samilski’s employee pension plan had a projected benefit obligation (PBO) of $320 million. Also, unrecognized prior service costs were $35 million, the fair value of plan assets was $316 million, and the unrecognized actuarial gain was $21 million.

Carson believes the rate of compensation increase will be 5% as opposed to 4% in the previous year, and the discount rate will be 7% as opposed to 8% in the previous year.

This past year, Samilski began using special purpose entities (SPEs) for various reasons. In preparation for analyzing the SPE disclosures in the footnotes to the financial statements, Carson prepares a memo on SPEs. In the memo, he correctly concludes that the company will be required under new accounting rules to classify them as variable interest entities (VIE) and consolidate the entities on the balance sheet rather than report them using the equity method as in the past.

Which of the following items, when recognized, will likely increase:

PBO? Pension expense?
A . Actuarial loss ;Expected return on plan assets
B . Actuarial loss ;Amortization of prior service costs
C . Actuarial gain ;Amortization of prior service costs

View Answer

Answer: B

Explanation:

An actuarial loss results from a change in actuarial assumptions. In the case of a loss, the amount of pension benefits payable in the future would increase, thus increasing the PBO. Actuarial gains have the opposite effect.

The amortization of prior service costs results in pension expense being increased gradually over a number of years, rather than all at once in the year of occurrence. In contrast, the expected return on plan assets is an "income" component in calculating pension cost (service cost and interest cost being the expense components), so recognition of expected return on plan assets would decrease pension expense. (Study Session 6, LOS 22.b)