if a company receives a bill for something they bought in 2016, but don't technically pay it until 2017, the bill would still show up in their 2016 repo

if a company receives a bill for something they bought in 2016, but don't technically pay it until 2017, the bill would still show up in their 2016 reports. Yes if you're using accrual basis, but not if you're using cash basis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basis_of_accounting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basis_of_accounting (Any big company will be using accrual basis, though.)