Editing Capital asset (section)

==US tax definition versus broader economic definition==
In their textbook on the [[Financial accountancy|financial accounting]], authors Clyde P. Stickney and [[Roman L. Weil]]<ref name="Stickney">Clyde P. Stickney and [[Roman L. Weil]], ''Financial Accounting'', p. 622.</ref> advise that the term should be avoided except in [[Tax accounting in the United States|tax accounting]] in the US private context, to counter its usage in other contexts vaguely. For example, it is often used as a synonym for [[fixed assets]]<ref name="Clark">John Owen Edward Clark, ''Dictionary of International Accounting Terms'', p. 98</ref> or for investments in [[Security (finance)|securities]].<ref name="Stickney"/>

Several public sector standards in global use, notably [[triple bottom line]] accounting as defined by [[ICLEI]] for world cities, require that employees or the environment or something else be treated as a capital asset. In this context, it means managers have a responsibility to maintain, and to report changes in value as gains or losses of the capital assets.<ref name="Robinson">David F. Robinson, "Human asset accounting", ''Long Range Planning'', v. 7, i. 1, February 1974, Pp. 58-60.</ref>

Capital assets should not be confused with the [[Capital requirement|capital]] a financial institution is required to hold. This [[Capital requirement|capital]] is computed from the right-hand side of the [[balance sheet]] while [[asset]]s are found on the left-hand side.<ref name="Stickney" />