ACCOUNTING TERMS - ACCOUNTING DICTIONARY - ACCOUNTING GLOSSARY
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EMPLOYEE STOCK OWNERSHIP PLAN Definition
EMPLOYEE STOCK OWNERSHIP PLAN (ESOP) is an employee benefit to acquire ownership of shares in their company without necessarily laying out personal capital.
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PROFIT MULTIPLE: Profit and sales multiples are the most widely used valuation benchmarks used in valuing a business. The information needed are pretax profits and a market multiplier, which may be 1, 2, 3, or 4 and usually a ceiling of 5. The market multiplier can be found in various financial publications, as well as analyzing the sale of comparable businesses. This method is easy to understand and use. The profit multiple is often used as the valuation ceiling benchmark.
CAPITAL MAINTENANCE contains two concepts, a financial concept and a physical concept. Most entities adopt a financial concept of capital maintenance. Under this concept a profit is earned only if the monetary amount of net assets at the end of the period, excluding distributions/contributions to/from owners, exceeds the monetary amount of net assets at the beginning of the period. Financial capital maintenance is usually measured in monetary units; however, the requirement to report the impact of hyperinflation results in the measurement of assets and liabilities in monetary units of constant purchasing power.

