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1993 SNA Update Information - Country comments for issue:
Super dividend, capital injections and reinvested earnings (government transactions with public corporations (earnings and funding))

Issue description
Issue description in [English] | [French] | [Russian] | [Spanish]
The 1993 SNA treatment of withdrawals from quasi-corporations differs from that of payment of dividends from corporations. Dividends are always assumed to be from current earnings, but withdrawals from quasi-corporations may not be. Public corporations are often quasi-corporations and the treatment accorded quasi-corporations allows government to manage the pattern of withdrawals from one year to another for political reasons. Should the SNA be amended to limit this possibility and if so which of two possibilities is recommended?
The first option is to bring the treatment for quasi-corporations more into line with that for corporations in respect of large and exceptional payments (like super-dividends) as well as of capital injections made by the government as the owner.
The second option would be to adopt an approach for public corporations similar to that for direct investment enterprises and show redistributed earnings (or losses ) of public corporations as accruing in the government accounts and then reinvested in (or withdrawn from) the equity of the corporation.
Country comments
Number of country comments for selected issue:18
  Date postedSourceComment
 10/10/2006SwedenFurther clarification/analysis required
 9/29/2006Bank of KoreaWe assent to the recommendations of the AEG in general. We think, however, that it is necessary to indicate more concrete criterions to classify distributions of entrepreneurial income between government and public corporations or public quasi-corporations. Many various and detailed examples are also required to apply criterions to record the transactions.
The reinvested earnings approach should be examined sufficiently and carefully. Furthermore, detailed guidelines of this approach are required to apply in practice.
 9/15/2006United KingdomWe support the recommended option which will reduce the uncertainties inherent in the present SNA. However, we reject recommendation (d). For consistency, principles applied to one sector should apply to all. The framework loses usefulness if specific rules are made for one sector that are not applied to all.
 9/15/2006LatviaAfter deep discussions and expert consultations we basically support the 1993 SNA Update Issues.After deep discussions and expert consultations we basically support the 1993 SNA Update Issues.
 8/18/2006USAWe generally agree with the recommendations of the AEG, but we would like to have seen a stronger endorsement for the “reinvested earnings approach,” which we regard as the conceptually correct treatment for corporations that are fully owned and controlled by government.
 8/1/2006Central Bank of ChileSe recomienda que el tratamiento dado por las cuasi - sociedades públicas a los pagos extraordinarios hechos al gobierno, retiros de capital, sea adoptado por las sociedades públicas en lo relacionado con los pagos excepcionales y de montos elevados (dividendos extraordinarios), ya que el origen de ambos proviene de fondos acumulados o de venta de activos; así como los aportes de capital del gobierno en calidad de propietario.
Estas recomendaciones propuestas tienden a mejorar la definición de la Situación Patrimonial del Gobierno y, en tal sentido, estamos de acuerdo con aplicar las recomendaciones de unificar criterios de registro para las operaciones señaladas.
 7/31/2006ChinaThe share of public corporations and quasi-corporations in the economy of China is considerable large, therefore, the consistent record of exceptional payments either from public corporations/quasi-corporations to government or vise versa has important implications. The challenges in practice is that China’s government finance statistics can not provide detailed information on current payments from public corporations/quasi-corporations to government, or exceptional from public corporations/quasi-corporations to government. Meanwhile, regarding the payments from the government to public corporations/quasi-corporations, it is also impossible to distinguish loss-cover injection from commercial injection based on the current government finance statistics in China.
 7/28/2006VietnamWe agree with a draft of Government dividends and capital transactions with public corporations and Granting and activation of guarantees in update SNA.
 7/28/2006FranceL’INSEE approuve les efforts faits pour clarifier et préciser, dans le SCN, le traitement des relations entre les administrations publiques et les entreprises publiques qu’elles détiennent. Les propositions faites rejoignent ce qui se fait déjà en Europe, qui possède sur ce point une solide expérience.
L’INSEE est réservé sur l’extention aux sociétés publiques du traitement actuellement adopté pour les entreprises d’investissement direct étranger. Il approuve donc le fait que cette extension éventuelle ait été écartée par l’AEG, tout au moins dans le cadre du présent processus de mise à jour du SCN93. Il est préférable d’adopter une approche plus rigoureuse pour définir les sociétés publiques mais celles-ci, comme l’indique le SCN93, doivent être traitées d’une manière analogue aux sociétés privées.
 7/28/2006AustraliaThe Frankfurt meeting of AEG did not fully resolve this issue. A paper has been produced on the practicalities of the "reinvested earnings approach". This work has been passed onto the SNA update Project Manager and Editor.
 7/28/2006LithuaniaIn general we support the recommendations.
 7/24/2006GermanyThe conceptual recommendations adopted by the AEG are reasonable.
We support the AEG expressively, by underlining that in cases a)-c) the exceptionality of the payment must be emphasized. In addition it should be made clear that not individual pay-ments have to be checked (which is impossible at least ion a federally organized country) but that this refers to the statistical measurement at the macro-economic level.
Similarly to the AEG, we also fear that the so called re-invested earnings approach to payments between governments and public corporations causes imbalances in the system. In addition, this approach will require very detailed data, sometimes on a time series basis, to keep the system consistent.
 7/10/2006DenmarkAgreement
 12/13/2005CanadaCanada does not support the altering the current treatment, based on the argument that that these unusual flows “affect the level of government debt and deficit inappropriately”. We feel that it is not for national accountants to determine the appropriateness or transparency of government accounting. Rather national accountants are tasked with measuring economic and financial transactions (and positions). Canada’s view is that the re-invested earnings approach is conceptually flawed, and we would not like to see it extended to governments and public corporations. The re-investment of imputed earnings is not defined in the financial account (i.e., as a financial transactions) and it gives rise to a stock-flow problem in the overall sequence of accounts (see the final report of the Task Force on the Valuation and Measurement of Equity. The latest paper on this topic (February AEG) proposes an alternative approach to re-invested earnings (flowing the European EMGDD and IMFGFS 2001). While a better approach than re-invested earnings, it also has problems. In particular, unusual transactions would be forced into the financial account only. The Financial Account is not defined to handle income flows and gives rise to similar issues as is the case with the re-invested earnings approach.
 11/29/2005EstoniaWe have no strong position on this issue. Bearing in mind the conservative approach we would not change the current practice.
 5/27/2005PakistanAgrees to the proposal to extend the treatment of reinvested earnings as in the BOP to the relations between general government and public corporations.
 5/13/2005State Bank of PakistanThe treatment of re-invested earnings as in the BOP should be extended to the relations between general government and public corporations.
 4/11/2005PhilippinesIn the Philippines, the participation of government in public corporations is recorded as equity investments. Government also provides support in the form of subsidies to public corporations. In most cases government do not get their share of the earnings of public corporations, except in the form of dividends which can be considered as reinvested earnings but these are not explicitly recorded. How do we deal with these transactions?
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