Uma análise dos efeitos inflacionários sobre demonstrações contábeis de empresas brasileiras traduzidas para apresentação no exterior.

Abstract

Since 1996 Brazilian Companies has issued stocks at American Stock Exchanges as a way to obtain financial resources. These companies are asked by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to translate their financial statements into American Dollars and present them in accordance with the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles in the USA (US GAAP). As stipulated by the American accounting pronouncements for translation of financial statements into foreign currency, Brazil was considered a highly inflationary economy until July 1997, although the Law 9.249/95 had established that from 1996 on companies would no longer record monetary correction, an accounting technique designed to reflect the effects of inflation. This study presents a comparative analysis among the financial statements in accordance with the Brazilian Corporate Law and the financial statements elaborated using the Constant Currency Method, from 1996 to 1999, of some Brazilian Companies in this situation, with the objective of demonstrate the effects of inflation on this period upon accounting information. It also identifies some of the differences between Brazilian accounting practices and those practices recommended by US GAAP found on the financial statements analyzed. It concludes that in 1996 and 1997 Brazilian and American investors had access to different information, because of the use of monetary correction only on financial statements reported in the USA, and that the decision of ceasing the