Which financial statements are required for a private purpose trust fund?

Summaries / Status

Summary of Statement No. 84Fiduciary Activities(Issued 01/17)

The objective of this Statement is to improve guidance regarding the identification of fiduciary activities for accounting and financial reporting purposes and how those activities should be reported.

This Statement establishes criteria for identifying fiduciary activities of all state and local governments. The focus of the criteria generally is on (1) whether a government is controlling the assets of the fiduciary activity and (2) the beneficiaries with whom a fiduciary relationship exists. Separate criteria are included to identify fiduciary component units and postemployment benefit arrangements that are fiduciary activities.

An activity meeting the criteria should be reported in a fiduciary fund in the basic financial statements. Governments with activities meeting the criteria should present a statement of fiduciary net position and a statement of changes in fiduciary net position. An exception to that requirement is provided for a business-type activity that normally expects to hold custodial assets for three months or less.

This Statement describes four fiduciary funds that should be reported, if applicable: (1) pension (and other employee benefit) trust funds, (2) investment trust funds, (3) private-purpose trust funds, and (4) custodial funds. Custodial funds generally should report fiduciary activities that are not held in a trust or equivalent arrangement that meets specific criteria.

A fiduciary component unit, when reported in the fiduciary fund financial statements of a primary government, should combine its information with its component units that are fiduciary component units and aggregate that combined information with the primary government’s fiduciary funds.

This Statement also provides for recognition of a liability to the beneficiaries in a fiduciary fund when an event has occurred that compels the government to disburse fiduciary resources. Events that compel a government to disburse fiduciary resources occur when a demand for the resources has been made or when no further action, approval, or condition is required to be taken or met by the beneficiary to release the assets.

Effective Date

The requirements of this Statement are effective for reporting periods beginning after December 15, [2019]. Earlier application is encouraged.

How the Changes in This Statement Will Improve Financial Reporting

The requirements of this Statement will enhance consistency and comparability by (1) establishing specific criteria for identifying activities that should be reported as fiduciary activities and (2) clarifying whether and how business-type activities should report their fiduciary activities. Greater consistency and comparability enhances the value provided by the information reported in financial statements for assessing government accountability and stewardship.


 

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Unless otherwise specified, pronouncements of the GASB apply to financial reports of all state and local governmental entities, including general purpose governments; public benefit corporations and authorities; public employee retirement systems; and public utilities, hospitals and other healthcare providers, and colleges and universities. Paragraph 2 discusses the applicability of this Statement.  

For governmental entities to ensure the proper segregation of resources and to maintain proper accountability, the accounting system should be organized and operated on a fund basis. Each fund is a separate fiscal entity and is established to conduct specific activities and attain objectives in accordance with statutes, laws, regulations, and restrictions or for specific purposes. A fund is defined in GASB Codification Section 1300 as a fiscal and accounting entity with a self-balancing set of accounts recording cash and other financial resources, together with all related liabilities and residual equities or balances, and changes therein, which are segregated for the purpose of carrying on specific activities or attaining certain objectives in accordance with special regulations, restrictions, or limitations.

GASB Statement 34 modified the structure of two categories of funds used by local governmental entities. Specifically, the following two new types of funds were introduced:

• Permanent Funds (in the governmental fund category). Permanent funds are required to be used to report resources that are legally restricted to the extent that only earnings (and not principal) may be used for purposes that support the reporting government programs.

• Private-Purpose Trust Funds (in the fiduciary fund category). Private-purpose trust funds should be used to report all other trust arrangements under which both principal and income benefit individuals, private organizations, or other governments.

GASB Statement 34 eliminated expendable and nonexpendable trust funds to focus fiduciary reporting on resources held for parties external to the reporting government: individuals, private organizations, and other governments. Fiduciary funds, therefore, cannot be used to support the government's own programs. As noted above, a nonexpendable trust fund that supports the government's own programs is reported as a permanent fund. It should be noted that an expendable trust that supports a government's own programs would be reported as a special revenue fund.

In summary, there are three categories of funds as follows:

• Governmental funds are those through which most governmental functions are accounted for. The acquisition, use, and balances of the government's expendable financial resources and the related current liabilities—except those accounted for in proprietary funds—are accounted for through governmental funds (general, special revenue, capital project, debt service, and permanent funds).
• Proprietary funds are used to account for a government's ongoing activities that are similar to those often found in the private sector. All assets, liabilities, net assets, revenues, expenses, and transfers relating to the government's business and quasibusiness activities—in which changes in net assets or cost recovery are measured—are accounted for through proprietary funds (enterprise and internal service funds). Generally Accepted Accounting Principles for proprietary funds are similar to those applicable to private-sector businesses; the measurement focus is on determining operating income, financial position, and cash flows.
• Fiduciary funds are used to account for assets held by a government in a trustee capacity or as an agent for individuals, private organizations, or other governmental units. The fiduciary fund category includes pension (and other employee benefits, as well as other postemployment benefits) trust funds, investment trust funds, private-purpose trust funds, and agency funds.

Additional information on governmental fund structure may be found in chapter 5.

Major Funds

The concept of major fund reporting was introduced and defined by GASB Statement 34 to simplify the presentation of fund information and to focus attention on the major activities of the reporting entity. Rather than requiring each type of fund to be individually presented, Statement 34 requires the individual presentation of only major funds, with all other funds combined into a single column. This reduces the number of funds presented on the face of the financial statement and directs the focus to the significant funds of the reporting entity. Major fund reporting is applied only to governmental funds (i.e., general, special revenue, debt service, capital project, and permanent funds) and enterprise funds. Internal service funds are excluded from the major fund reporting requirements. Fiduciary fund information is presented by type of fund rather than by major funds.

GASB defines major funds as those meeting the following criteria:

• The total assets, liabilities, revenues, or expenditures/expenses of the individual governmental or enterprise fund are at least 10 percent of the corresponding total (assets, liabilities, etc.) for all funds in that category (governmental funds) or of that type (enterprise funds).
• The total assets, liabilities, revenues, or expenditures/expenses of the individual governmental or enterprise fund are at least 5 percent of the corresponding total for all governmental and enterprise funds combined.

Both criteria must be met in the same element (assets, liabilities, etc.) for a fund to be defined as major. However, GASB Statement 34 permits a government to designate a particular fund that is of interest to users as a major fund and to individually present its information in the basic financial statements, even if it does not meet the criteria. However, a government does not have the option to not report a fund as major if it meets the criteria above.

It should be noted that in applying the major fund criteria to enterprise funds, the reporting entity should consider both operating and nonoperating revenues and expenses, as well as gains, losses, capital contributions, additions to permanent endowments, and special items. When the major fund criteria are applied to governmental funds, revenues do not include other financing sources and expenditures do not include other financing uses. However, special items would be included.

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