Inflationary distortions in cooperatives

Abstract

The present research aims at comparing the economics and financial evaluation indexes of the agriculture cooperatives of Parana by methods of measurement at historical cost and corrected historical cost. Therefore, the study is based on data from the Balance Sheet and Statement of Leavings and Losses from 49 cooperatives of Parana between 2010 and 2014, in nominal values. It can be verified that the indebtedness, immobilization of stockholder’s equity and debt costs indexes decreased their values when they were corrected. On the other hand, the indexes related to profitability presented a decrease only in the year 2010, and between the years 2011 to 2014, the indexes calculated based on corrected values were higher than indexes calculated at historical cost. The tests showed significant differences in the average of indebtedness, profitability and debt cost, but the monetary restatement of the immobilization of stockholder’s equity did not present a significant discrepancy. When the sample was stratified by the agroindustrial system, it was possible to verify that only the cooperatives that sell cereals showed the same results, considering the inflation effects. For the cooperatives that industrialize their products, all the indexes analyzed showed significant disparity and, for the cooperatives that operate in other activities and livestock, only the structural capital and debt cost indexes were shown to be significantly different. Thereby, it is concluded, in the context of the cooperatives analyzed, that the disregard of inflation decreases the relevance of the information, considering that the historical cost reported values represent a distortion from reality in inflationary environments.

Keywords: historical cost, indexed historical cost, inflation, performance indicators.