Artículo 22. Identifying Significant Accounts and Disclosures and Their Relevant Assertions

.60 To identify significant accounts and disclosures and their relevant assertions in accordance with paragraph .59e, the auditor should evaluate the qualitative and quantitative risk factors related to the financial statement line items and disclosures. Risk factors relevant to the identification of significant accounts and disclosures and their relevant assertions include: Size and composition of the account; Susceptibility to misstatement due to error or fraud; Volume of activity, complexity, and homogeneity of the individual transactions processed through the account or reflected in the disclosure; Nature of the account or disclosure; Accounting and reporting complexities associated with the account or disclosure; Exposure to losses in the account; Possibility of significant contingent liabilities arising from the activities reflected in the account or disclosure; Existence of related party transactions in the account; and Changes from the prior period in account and disclosure characteristics. .60A Additional risk factors relevant to the identification of significant accounts and disclosures involving accounting estimates include the following: The degree of uncertainty associated with the future occurrence or outcome of events and conditions underlying the significant assumptions; The complexity of the process for developing the accounting estimate; The number and complexity of significant assumptions associated with the process; The degree of subjectivity associated with significant assumptions (for example, because of significant changes in the related events and conditions or a lack of available observable inputs); and If forecasts are important to the estimate, the length of the forecast period and degree of uncertainty regarding trends affecting the forecast. .61 As part of identifying significant accounts and disclosures and their relevant assertions, the auditor also should determine the likely sources of potential misstatements that would cause the financial statements to be materially misstated. The auditor might determine the likely sources of potential misstatements by asking himself or herself "what could go wrong?" within a given significant account or disclosure. .62 The risk factors that the auditor should evaluate in the identification of significant accounts and disclosures and their relevant assertions are the same in the audit of internal control over financial reporting as in the audit of the financial statements; accordingly, significant accounts and disclosures and their relevant assertions are the same for both audits. Note: In the financial statement audit, the auditor might perform substantive auditing procedures on financial statement accounts, disclosures, and assertions that are not determined to be significant accounts and disclosures and relevant assertions. 35 .63 The components of a potential significant account or disclosure might be subject to significantly differing risks. .64 When a company has multiple locations or business units, the auditor should identify significant accounts and disclosures and their relevant assertions based on the consolidated financial statements. 35A