Global Marine Energy.

Aither,
My analogy of a clothing busines is not fictitious. I own a clothing business and we never write off/down stock values for the accounts. We either sell them at a profit or loss. Having said that we rarely sell at a loss. The value of stock held is always the cost price for Y/E final accounts. Some businesses do write down goods or materials to reduce their tax liabilities and others fictitiously inflate them when they want to borrow money. In my business the only assets that diminish in value are fixtures and fittings and motor vehicles. Even shop properties are shown at their original cost despite some of them having been bought more than twenty years ago. By the way every time I come home and look at my house, even though its valuation has quadrupled since I bought it I have not made a profit on it. I can only do this when I sell it. I made profit on previous houses but only at the time of selling,
When you submit your personal tax return you can only show losses and profits of shares you have dealt in and not the valuation of those shares you still hold. Why? Because you have neither lost nor gained till you sell them. I rest my case.