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Chapter 5 — Accounting Matters

5.6 Liabilities, Equity, and Temporary Equity

5.6 Liabilities, Equity, and Temporary Equity

The SEC historically has focused on the classification of financial instruments as liabilities or equity in the balance sheet when those financial instruments have redemption provisions or possess characteristics of both liabilities and equity. For example, the classification of embedded features within convertible debt instruments and freestanding warrants is often scrutinized since they may contain both liability and equity components under U.S. GAAP.4

Footnotes

4
For more information about the classification of warrants issued in SPAC transactions, see Section D.6.
5
These disclosures are required by SAB Topic 4.C (codified as ASC 505-10-S99-4) as well as for changes in capital structure that involve a stock dividend.