Subsidiary
In accounting, subsidiary means a company that another company, the parent, owns or controls. It is a separate legal entity with its own books; a wholly owned LLC subsidiary that has not elected corporate status is disregarded for income tax but not for state law or payroll.
Authority: ASC 810-10 (opens in a new tab). Sources
The lessons that teach this
From the free founder back-office course, taught on one company's books, with exercises to work it yourself.
- EntitiesUS companies for founders abroad › The Delaware flipA new Delaware parent over a company formed abroad, by share exchange — and tax questions in both countries.4 min
- EntitiesParents, subsidiaries and groupsDisregarded, consolidated or separate: how a subsidiary is taxed, and a $12,000 intercompany fee booked in each entity and eliminated in the group.8 min
Subsidiary, in use
Quoted from the 4 documents that use the word: what it does to an interface, in the spec's own words.
A NetSuite OneWorld account already has all three, and every record carries a subsidiary field you must respect on read and on write.
Ledger APIs: Xero, QuickBooks Online, NetSuite — 2. Identity, tenancy, and the entity boundary
Someone who thinks they're reading the group while looking at one subsidiary will make decisions on the wrong numbers.
Both are correct answers to different questions. **Format in the viewer's locale, in the value's currency.** A German accountant reviewing a US subsidiary sees 1.234,56 $, and that's right.
What it is not called
Each of these means something else. Use one here and an accountant reading the product notices.
- division
- branch (parts of the same entity)
Also in Entity types
Defined in Lexicon. This page is generated from that document, so the two can't disagree.