Final answer:
An adjusted trial balance is a financial statement presenting all account balances after adjustments, verifying that total debits equal total credits. An example is updating a bank's balance sheet after an open market transaction. Such adjustments are necessary for the accurate creation of financial statements.
Step-by-step explanation:
The trial balance taken immediately after all adjustments have been posted is typically referred to as the adjusted trial balance. This financial report includes all the account titles and balances of a company after the adjusting entries for expenses, revenues, assets, and liabilities have been made at the end of an accounting period. This step is critical because it verifies the equality of debits and credits after adjustments, which is necessary for the accurate preparation of financial statements such as the balance sheet and income statement.
To illustrate with an example related to the provided reference steps, if Acme Bank conducts transactions that affect its balance sheet, such as an open market sale of Treasury bonds to the bank by the Federal Reserve, the bank would then adjust its assets and liabilities to maintain its required reserves. If the adjusted trial balance reflects the necessary changes, showing that all debits are equal to credits, this would mean that the accounting entries have been properly recorded.
For tasks involving summarizing columns of financial data, such as Exports, Imports, and Balance, the resulting sum would represent a related financial metric such as the current account balance. This is a part of the larger concept of the balance of payments which provides important information about a country's financial transactions with the rest of the world.