What closing entries would McDonald’s have made in 2016 based on its trial balance?

McDonald’s Corporation (NYSE: MCD) is a publicly held corporation and issued its financial statements for 2016 in 2017. To follow is a condensed and adapted trial balance as of December 31, 2016, that was constructed from those financial statements.

Please note that the accounts have been adapted and condensed for educational use and should not be used for investment decisions.

McDonald’s complete, unabridged financial statements can be found on its investor relations website.

Note: The trial balance above can also be downloaded in Excel file for enhanced readability.

Discussion Questions

1. What are closing entries? Why are they made?
2. What accounts on McDonald’s trial balance should be closed?
3. Using the McDonald’s trial balance, what closing entries would McDonald’s make for 2016?
4. What was McDonald’s net income for the year ended December 31, 2016?

Instructor Resources

These resources are provided to give the instructor flexibility for use of Accounting in the Headlines articles in the classroom. The blog posting itself can be assigned via a link to this site OR by distributing the student handout below. Alternatively, the PowerPoint file below contains a bullet point overview of the article and the discussion questions.

• Student handout (pdf) (word) (contains entire blog posting + discussion questions)
• PowerPoint file (brief article overview + discussion questions)

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