Extraordinary Item

Gains or losses included in a company's financial statements, which are infrequent and unusual in nature. These are usually explained further in the "notes to the financial statements."

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These are the result of unforeseen and atypical events. They are usually accounted for separately so they don't skew the company's regular earnings.

An example would be a snowstorm in Hawaii creating extraordinary losses to banana crops. These losses might be written down as a one-time charge due to an extraordinary item.

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One that is both unusual in nature and infrequent in occurrence. Extraordinary gains and losses are presented Net of Tax separately in the income statement. They appear between Income from Discontinued Operations and cumulative effect of a Change in Accounting Principle. Examples of extraordinary items are casualty losses, losses from expropriation of assets by a foreign government, gain on life insurance, gain or loss on the early extinguishment of debt, gain on troubled debt restructuring, and write-off of an intangible asset.

Write-down and write-off of receivables and inventory are not extraordinary because they relate to normal business operational activities. They would be considered extraordinary, however, if they resulted from an Act of God (e.g., casualty loss arising from an earthquake) or governmental expropriation.