I'm not sure which of us is confused and it doesn't matter: let us say that there is a confusion about double entry, which I used to have and no longer do. It'

I'm not sure which of us is confused and it doesn't matter: let us say that there is a confusion about double entry, which I used to have and no longer do. It's exactly having from: and to: in a single entry which makes for double entry accounting. Or one from: and several to: but that's effectively an elision. By implication there is a second double-entry on the other side, but that's often their business, not mine: as an example, the Income statements in my personal ledger are balanced by an Expenses:Payroll on the other side... spiritually, I neither know nor care about the details of how that accounting is done. In the special case that both accounts are internal to the business, then yes, expense on one account becomes asset on the other. Whether that is one or two (double) entries depends on a bunch of things. In terms of specific data modeling, I would urge you that yes, the rows corresponding to any debit or credit should include a 'from' field. The reasons are numerous, and have more to do with audit than data integrity per se. The sufficient reason is that there might not be a counterparty inside your database.