Réserve (en Belgique)

Les réserves proviennent généralement de bénéfices conservés à la disposition de la société jusqu'à décision contraire de ses organes compétents.

Elles se distinguent du bénéfice reporté par le fait qu'elles ne font pas, comme ce dernier, automatiquement partie du résultat à affecter de l'exercice suivant.
A l'exception des réserves immunisées (ou du moins certaines d'entre elles), les réserves trouvent leur origine dans la décision d'affectation du résultat.


n financial accounting, "reserve" always has a credit balance and can refer to a part of shareholders' equity, a liability for estimated claims, or contra-asset for uncollectible accounts.

A reserve can appear in any part of shareholders' equity except for contributed or basic share capital. In nonprofit accounting, an "operating reserve" is the unrestricted cash on hand available to sustain an organization, and nonprofit boards usually specify a target of maintaining several months of operating cash or a percentage of their annual income, called an Operating Reserve Ratio. [1]

There are different types of reserves used in financial accounting like capital reserves, revenue reserves, statutory reserves, realized reserves, unrealized reserves.


n financial accounting, "reserve" always has a credit balance and can refer to a part of shareholders' equity, a liability for estimated claims, or contra-asset for uncollectible accounts.

A reserve can appear in any part of shareholders' equity except for contributed or basic share capital. In nonprofit accounting, an "operating reserve" is the unrestricted cash on hand available to sustain an organization, and nonprofit boards usually specify a target of maintaining several months of operating cash or a percentage of their annual income, called an Operating Reserve Ratio. [1]

There are different types of reserves used in financial accounting like capital reserves, revenue reserves, statutory reserves, realized reserves, unrealized reserves.

Equity reserves are created from several possible sources:

Reserves created from shareholders' contributions, the most common examples of which are:
legal reserve fund - it is required in many legislations and it must be paid as a percentage of share capital
share premium - amount paid by shareholders for shares in excess of their nominal value
Within the framework of capital increase by share premium a larger proportion of capital increase is placed into a capital reserve while the subscribed capital is increased by a minimum amount. This is because the initial losses are covered by the capital reserve. If capital increase was carried out fully or to a significant degree through the increase of subscribed capital, equity could easily fall to below the subscribed capital due to the losses.[2]

Reserves created from profit, especially retained earnings, i.e. accumulated accounting profits, or in the case of nonprofits, operating surpluses. However, profits may be distributed also to other types of reserves, for example:
legal reserve fund from profit - many legislations require creation of the fund as a percentage of profits
remuneration reserve - will be used later to pay bonuses to employees or management.
translation reserve - arises during consolidation of entities with different reporting currencies
Reserve is the profit achieved by a company where a certain amount of it is put back into the business which can help the business in their rainy days. The preceding sentence may give the unwary reader the sense that this item is an asset, a debit balance. This is false. A reserve is always a credit balance. Retained Earnings typically has a credit balance. If a firm wants to label part of Retained Earnings as a Reserve for Reinvestment, then that labeling does not harm, but neither does it do anything about making assets, liquid or otherwise, available for any day, rainy or otherwise.

Sometimes reserve is used in the sense of provision. This is inconsistent with the terminology suggested by International Accounting Standards Board. For more information about provisions, see provision (accounting). The preceding is, indeed, correct IASB usage, but be aware in the U.S., under U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, "provision" refers to a debit balance, not a credit balance. "Provision" is a dangerous word to use in attempting to achieve clear communications in conversations with U.S. and IASB conversations. "Provision for Income Taxes" means expense in U.S. GAAP and liability in IASB vernacular.

Source; wikipedia

French term (edited): Réserve/s statutairement indisponible/s

of BrE : Association AmE: Incorporation

Capital reserve in UK company law is undistributable, as opposed to distributable reserve capital and a crucial difference that alert ProZ accountants may be seeing fit to picking up on.

Statutaire/ment can also be translated as 'corporate/ly' rather than statutorily, as warned by Bridge.

Statutes are written laws.
'Associates within society decide on particular aspects of the constitution of society with respect to statutory law. Whenever conditions are combined, society is obliged to make a reserve following the particular modes mentioned.'
The mode comprises the methods, means and ways of achieving an objective.


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Note added at 7 hrs (2021-07-13 23:33:07 GMT)
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Note that a statute is a written law, or a law enacted by governent. Statutory laws are enacted and authorized by statutes.
https://www.thefreedictionary.com/statutory
Note the reference below. It explains what the reserve funds are in a society or a business enterprise, and how those are stipulated by statutes. The statutes are the written terms and conditions of a society's constitution.
https://www.l-expert-comptable.com/a/529699-qu-est-ce-que-la...
FR:"Des réserves légales et indispensables sont créés en application de la loi ou des statuts."
EN: "The legal and unavailable reserves are created on application of the law or the articles of association."
https://www.linguee.com/french-english/translation/réserves ...

We speak of company statutes as well as articles of association so I don't see why we should so readily abandon "statutory"
Once again, I prone a direct translation where the translation is pretty clear and it reflects that we are speaking of a French system
Where company accounts are published in French and English, it also makes it clear which entries in French correspond to the English ones. It's also a question of practicality.
Lastly, "Unavailable reserves as per the by-laws" has zero ghits so I don't think there is even an argument for saying that this is the standard English term and equivalent

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Note added at 21 hrs (2021-07-14 13:13:05 GMT)
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Taken Steve Robbie's and AllegroTrans's comments, perhaps

"non-distributable company statutes reserve"

not available = cannot be distributed, as another answerer said, but "indisponibles" is the wording here, so "not available" or "unavailable"

statuts = Articles of Association < statutairement

reserves: there are various types of reserves, governed by different rules


It's fairly basic company law, really.

Timothy Rake adequately answered the question 25 mins after it was posted, but FWIW this is the exact wording I would use.

Most of this has already been said:
- “Indisponible” means unavailable for distribution, i.e. you can’t pay a dividend from it. In English, this is non-distributable or undistributable.
- “Réserve indisponible” is a standard term; a word-for-word translation of indisponible (“unavailable”) is not necessary, and in my view not especially helpful.
- “Statutairement” = statuts = articles of association or by-laws or company statutes, depending on your taste & jurisdiction. However, “statutory” in English primarily refers to statute law and should therefore be avoided. “Legal reserve” means a reserve imposed by law and is just plain wrong.
- The context may well relate to the specific Belgian provisions highlighted by Julie Barber, but the meaning of the words is obvious anyway.