Contra Account
Categories: Accounting
Excellent name for an action movie, if there's not a copyright infringement problem with the old Contra video game. But imagine the trailer: "He was their best assassin. Now they want him dead. But first, they have to catch him. Jason Statham is 'Contra Account.'" The script writes itself.
Until then, however, we'll have to settle for the current definition. Which has to do with accounting. [Sudden adrenaline crash...limbs feel rubbery...slight ringing in the ears.]
Contra balance involves an accounting technique where a balance is kept that is the opposite of the normal balance. So if you are keeping track of debits in one account, the contra account would have the associated credits. And vice versa.
It's like matter and antimatter. Or like...a good twin/evil twin situation.
It comes up frequently related to depreciation. An accountant is keeping a fixed asset account, giving (no surprise here) the value of a company's fixed assets. The contra account would be the accumulated depreciation account. This part of the ledger contains the accumulated depreciation of the assets listed in the fixed asset account. As depreciation takes value out of the fixed asset accounts (making it smaller), it adds to its contra version, the accumulated depreciation account.