1 Stock Ledger Overview

The Merchandising financial management module primarily aims to maintain an accurate stock ledger, export financial data to an external financial system, and monitor a company's performance based on key performance indices. Financial management activities include maintaining basic financial data (such as cost), formulating financial budgets, general ledger relationship maintenance, and stock ledger.

The stock ledger in Merchandising records the financial results of the merchandising processes such as buying, selling, price changes, and transfers. All of these transactions are recorded in the Merchandising stock ledger and rolled up to the subclass/location level for days, weeks, and months, depending on calendar settings. The aggregate levels in the stock ledger are used to measure inventory amounts and merchandise profitability. The stock ledger is mainly used for reporting purposes in Merchandising; however, there is some online visibility as well.

The stock ledger supports multiple currencies. All transaction-level information is stored in the local currency of the store or warehouse where the transaction occurred. As transaction-level information is rolled up to the aggregated levels in the stock ledger, records are kept in local currency and converted to primary currency. This allows corporate reporting to be performed in the primary currency of the company, while still providing visibility by location to the profitability in the local currency.

The stock ledger supports both the retail and cost methods of accounting. The cost method can use standard cost or average cost, depending on how the system is configured. The stock ledger supports both the retail (4-5-4) and the normal (Gregorian) calendar. If the retail calendar is used, data is maintained by the 4-5-4 month and the week. If the normal calendar is used, data is maintained only by the Gregorian month. Data can also be maintained daily using the retail (4-5-4) or normal (Gregorian) calendar.

Merchandising supports multiple sets of books. Clients that use multiple sets of books assign Merchandising locations to a particular set of books defined in an external financial system. Changes to the stock ledger affect the set of books with which a particular transaction is associated.