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Plain-text accounting insights, tutorials, and updates from the Beancount.io team.

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11 min read

Is Shipping Taxable? A Practical State-by-State Guide for Small Businesses

Whether shipping is taxable depends on the destination state, the taxability of the items, who billed the delivery, and whether the customer could avoid the charge. This guide covers the five questions that control the answer, the main state-rule patterns in New York, Texas, California, Florida, Illinois, and North Carolina, how to allocate delivery charges on mixed taxable and exempt orders, and a monthly checklist for defensible shipping-tax records.

Mike Thrift

sales-taxtax-compliancee-commerce
11 min read

Home Depot Q2 FY2026 Earnings: 75% of the Sales Growth Came From the SRS Distribution Bet

Home Depot's Q2 FY2026 sales rose 5.7% to $47.86B, but the Other/SRS distribution segment supplied about 75% of the $2.58B increase at a 4.9% operating margin versus 15.4% for retail. Roughly $685M of IEEPA tariff refunds cut cost of goods sold; backing it out puts inferred gross margin near 32.2% and operating margin near 12.9%, while comparable transactions fell 1.0%.

Mike Thrift

financial-reportingfinancial-analysisopen-ledger
10 min read

FinCEN Delayed the Investment Adviser AML Rule to 2028. The Clock Is Still Running.

FinCEN moved the investment adviser AML rule's effective date from January 1, 2026 to January 1, 2028, covering roughly 20,000 SEC-registered advisers and exempt reporting advisers. Here's what the rule requires — SARs at $5,000, CTRs above $10,000, travel-rule recordkeeping at $3,000 — and a 24-month plan to build the program before the deadline.

Mike Thrift

compliancerisk-assessmentsmall-business
11 min read

Cisco Q4 FY2026 Earnings: $9.3 Billion of AI Orders Against an 80% Inventory Build

Cisco's fiscal fourth quarter brought $17.25B of revenue (+18%), $3.86B of net income (+51%), 40% networking order growth and $9.3B of full-year hyperscaler AI orders — alongside inventory up 80% to $5.69B and full-year operating cash flow flat at $14.2B. A Beancount ledger reconciles the income statement, the inventory build and the deferred-revenue counterweight.

Mike Thrift

financial-reportingfinancial-analysisopen-ledger
10 min read

Wild Rice Harvester Bookkeeping: How to Manage an Unpredictable Harvest Window

Natural wild rice has a fixed August 15–September 30 season and a 9 a.m.–3 p.m. daily harvest window, so its bookkeeping must separate harvest, processing, inventory, and deferred customer deposits. This guide shows how to build a crop-based chart of accounts, treat preorders as a liability until earned, reconcile buyer settlements, and run a weekly cash check.

Mike Thrift

agriculturefarmingseasonal-business
12 min read

Tesla Q2 2026 Earnings: 480K Deliveries Could Not Save the Operating Margin

Tesla's Q2 2026 revenue rose 25.5% to $28.24 billion on 480,450 deliveries and a record 13.5 GWh of energy storage, yet operating income fell 57% to $398 million as R&D rose 49%, SG&A rose 45%, and regulatory-credit revenue dropped 67% to $146 million. A $1.0 billion unrealized gain on Tesla's SpaceX stake then lifted net income to $1.13 billion, nearly triple the operating result. Full income statement, balance sheet and FY2021-Q2 2026 history in a public Beancount ledger.

Mike Thrift

financial-reportingfinancial-analysisfinancial-statements
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