Re:Record €225m fine for WhatsApp Ireland over data protecti...
by stadium on Thursday September 02, 2021 @10:12AM
(#28392233)
Exactly this. It's a reserve for a future event likely to happen, with a material impact on the financials. Required by financial regulations. It might even be a footnote or called out as a business risk in a FB public financial statement.
Similar to a reserve for doubtful accounts receivable. X% of receivables aged 90 days past due are unlikely to ever be collected. That gets booked onto the financials.
Yes, but that would have been against this complaint when it arose - So in 2018 when the action started they took a look and figured they would have to pay a fine, accounted for it appropriately. They will now allocate the remainder of the amount, continue to appeal and maybe in another 3 years finally make payment on that fine.
Your comment suggests that they have a slush fund and try and break enough laws each year deliberately so they can spend the $77.5 budget they have for fines.
I am not a lawyer or accountant, but a public company not reporting a contingent liability for litigation in progress in their accounts would probably be a violation of all sorts of things.