Segment reporting definition

What is Segment Reporting?

Segment reporting is the reporting of the operating segments of a company in the disclosures accompanying its financial statements. Segment reporting is required for publicly-held entities, and is not required for privately held ones. Segment reporting is intended to give information to investors and creditors regarding the financial results and position of the most important operating units of a company, which they can use as the basis for decisions related to the company.

Under Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), an operating segment engages in business activities from which it may earn revenue and incur expenses, has discrete financial information available, and whose results are regularly reviewed by the entity's chief operating decision maker for performance assessment and resource allocation decisions.

Related AccountingTools Courses

Public Company Accounting and Finance

Segment Reporting Essentials

Segment Reporting Rules

Follow these rules to determine which segments need to be reported:

  • Aggregate the results of two or more segments if they have similar products, services, processes, customers, distribution methods, and regulatory environments.

  • Report a segment if it has at least 10% of the revenues, 10% of the profit or loss, or 10% of the combined assets of the entity.

  • If the total revenue of the segments you have selected under the preceding criteria comprise less than 75% of the entity's total revenue, then add more segments until you reach that threshold.

  • You can add more segments beyond the minimum just noted, but consider a reduction if the total exceeds ten segments.

Example of Segment Reporting

Lowry Locomotion has six business segments whose results it reports internally. Lowry’s controller needs to test the various segments to see which ones qualify as being reportable. He collects the following information:

In the table, the total profit exceeds the total loss, so the controller uses the total profit for the 10% profit test. The controller then lists the same table again, but now with the losses column removed and with test thresholds at the top of the table that are used to determine which segments are reported. An “X” mark below a test threshold indicates that a segment is reportable. In addition, the controller adds a new column on the right side of the table, which is used to calculate the total revenue for the reportable segments.

This analysis shows that the diesel locomotive, electric locomotive, passenger car, and trolley car segments are reportable, and that the combined revenue of these reportable segments easily exceeds the 75% reporting threshold. Consequently, the company does not need to separately report information for any additional segments.

What to Include in Segment Reporting

The information you should include in segment reporting includes the following items:

IFRS Segment Reporting

The segment reporting requirements under International Financial Reporting Standards are essentially identical to the requirements just noted under GAAP.

Related Article

Segment Margin