coût historique
Le coût historique est la règle consistant à enregistrer un bien dans les livres à ce que vous avez réellement payé, et non à sa valeur aujourd’hui.
Automatically translated. Read the original in English.
In plain English
Your uncle bought his plot of land in Ajah in 2004 for ₦800,000 and he still tells the story with joy, because that same plot now sells for well over ₦40,000,000. Your cousin, on the other hand, bought a phone last year for ₦250,000 and it is now worth maybe ₦120,000 if she tried to sell it today. Two assets, two completely different fortunes, yet in a company's books both would still sit at the price originally paid, untouched by either the land's fortune or the phone's misfortune.
That is what historical cost means in accounting. It says record the asset at what changed hands on the day you bought it, and leave that figure alone unless specific rules force a change. It does not ask what the market thinks the asset is worth this afternoon. It cares about the receipt, not the rumour.
A Nigerian manufacturing company that bought a factory building in Kano for ₦150,000,000 in 2010 will still show that building at ₦150,000,000 in its accounts today, minus whatever depreciation has been charged over the years, even though the building might fetch ₦600,000,000 if sold now because of how the area has developed. In the United Kingdom, a small bakery that bought its ovens for £20,000 five years ago records them at £20,000 less depreciation, regardless of what new ovens cost this year.
Diaspora families sending money home for property often get confused by this. The house Mama built with ₦3,000,000 in 2012 is not shown as worth today's ₦25,000,000 in any company records tied to it. The books are loyal to the original transaction, and that loyalty is the whole point, because it keeps the numbers checkable and honest rather than a matter of opinion.
A Lagos logistics firm buys a delivery van for ₦8,000,000 in 2019. By 2024 similar vans cost ₦15,000,000 due to naira depreciation and import costs, but the firm's books still show the original van at ₦8,000,000 less accumulated depreciation, not its current replacement cost.
Questions people ask
Why more than update asset values to match current market prices?
Market prices change constantly and often rely on guesswork or opinion, while the original purchase price is a fact backed by a receipt or contract. Historical cost keeps accounts verifiable, comparable across years, and harder to manipulate, even though it means the figures sometimes look outdated compared to real market value.
Does historical cost mean the asset's value never changes in the books at all?
Not quite. Depreciation reduces the book value of assets like machinery or vehicles over time to reflect wear and use, and certain assets under specific accounting rules can be revalued upward too. What historical cost refuses to do is casually chase the market price up and down without a proper accounting reason.
How does this affect a company's reported worth if property prices have risen a lot?
It usually means the company's balance sheet understates the true worth of its older assets, particularly land and buildings bought decades ago. This is why savvy investors often look beyond the balance sheet figure and ask what the property or equipment would actually fetch if sold today.
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