Accounting for Interest Rate Swaps: An Emerging Issue.

This article focuses on the issues of accounting for interest rate swaps in the U.S. Interest rate swaps can be viewed as long-term interest rate futures. They allow a company to alter its liabilities or revise its financing costs without new borrowing, resulting in cost savings and financial flexibility. Swaps create a new opportunity cost for firms via failure to employ swap techniques in practice. Interest rate swaps have evolved into a standard risk management tool. The accounting profession needs to anticipate and deal with the emerging issues raised by interest rate swap.