You can run any DualEntry report in your functional currency or translate it into a reporting currency. This is essential when you consolidate entities that operate in different currencies, for example, translating a EUR subsidiary’s financials into a USD parent’s reporting currency.
Functional vs. reporting currency
Each entity in DualEntry has a functional currency: the base currency in which you record day-to-day transactions. The functional currency is set during multi-currency setup and applies to every transaction in that entity’s books.
The reporting currency is the currency you want the report output in. When the functional and reporting currencies differ, DualEntry translates account balances using the rules described below. You select the reporting currency at report runtime from the currency picker, and the selection persists for the duration of your session. You can also set a default reporting currency per entity so that reports open in the preferred currency without manual selection each time.
Translation rules
DualEntry uses standard translation methods aligned with ASC 830 / IAS 21 conventions:
- Assets and liabilities: translate at the period-end (closing) exchange rate.
- Income and expenses: translate at the average exchange rate for the reporting period.
- Equity accounts: translate at historical rates, the rate in effect when the equity transaction originally occurred.
These rules apply automatically when you select a reporting currency that differs from the entity’s functional currency. DualEntry maintains a mapping between each account type and its translation method, so you do not configure translation rules at the individual account level. If you need to override the default method for a specific account (for example, translating a particular revenue account at the closing rate instead of the average rate), you configure the override in the chart of accounts settings.
Choosing a translation rate
When you translate a report, the currency picker asks which rate to translate at. There are three choices:
- System: the stored rates DualEntry maintains for the currency pair and date.
- Manual: a single rate you type in, applied to the whole report. Use this to model a specific rate or to reproduce a figure someone else calculated at a known rate.
- Consolidated: the consolidation rates of a parent company you select, which is how you translate a subsidiary into the parent’s reporting currency for group reporting.
Choosing Consolidated requires picking the parent company, since that is what determines both the target currency and the rates. The rates behind the system option come from the FX rate configuration in multi-currency setup.
Verify that FX rates are current before running translated reports. Stale or missing rates produce incomplete translations, and DualEntry flags affected accounts with a warning.
Running a translated report
Select the reporting currency from the currency picker on any report: standard financial statements, custom reports, or aging reports. DualEntry applies the translation rules to every line and displays the result in the selected currency.
The report header shows both the functional currency and the reporting currency so you can confirm the translation direction. Each line item displays the translated amount, and DualEntry recalculates all subtotals, totals, and variance columns in the reporting currency. If any line cannot be fully translated due to a missing exchange rate, DualEntry highlights that line and displays a warning indicator so you can address the gap before finalizing the report.
Cumulative translation adjustment (CTA)
When translated debits do not equal translated credits (a natural result of using different exchange rates for different account types), DualEntry creates a balancing entry called the cumulative translation adjustment. CTA posts to an equity account that you designate during multi-currency setup.
DualEntry computes CTA automatically during translation, and the CTA line appears in the equity section of the translated balance sheet. You do not create CTA entries manually.
The CTA amount changes each period as exchange rates fluctuate, so review it during close to understand how currency movements affected consolidated equity. If the balance is material, the flux report flags it for commentary like any other equity account variance.
The CTA Balance Audit report, under Accounting in Report Center, breaks the balance down when you need to see what drove it. Reach for it when the CTA moves more than the period’s rate changes seem to justify, since that usually points at a translation applied to an account you did not expect rather than at the rates themselves.
Comparing currencies side by side
Some reports support a dual-currency view that shows both functional and reporting currency columns on the same output. This is useful for reconciling translated amounts back to the source ledger. You enable the dual-currency view from the report’s column settings.
In the dual-currency view, each line item displays the functional currency amount, the reporting currency amount, and the exchange rate used for translation. This three-column layout makes it straightforward to verify individual translations and identify lines where the applied rate differs from your expectation. The dual-currency view is available on the balance sheet, income statement, and custom reports. You export the dual-currency view in the same formats (PDF, Excel, CSV) as the standard single-currency output.
Transaction-currency amounts on FX accounts
Running-balance columns on reports (balance sheet, GL detail, account activity) are always denominated in the entity’s functional currency. Transactions that were entered in a foreign currency show their original amount in a separate transaction currency column alongside the functional-currency amount and the FX rate used, but DualEntry does not compute a running balance in the transaction currency.
This is intentional: a single account can post activity in multiple currencies (for example, a USD bank account that occasionally receives EUR wires), so a running balance in “transaction currency” is not well-defined at the account level.
Sometimes you need a pure foreign-currency balance for a specific currency: for example, an AUD-only running balance on a EUR entity’s AUD bank account. In that case, export the account detail to Excel, filter to the currency you care about, and sum the transaction-currency column. For consolidation-scale reporting in a target currency, translate the entire report using the reporting currency picker instead.
For the initial configuration of currencies, entities, and FX rate sources, see multi-currency setup. For consolidated reporting across multiple entities, see multi-entity consolidation. 
