Recently Adopted Accounting Standards

3 Months Ended

Mar. 31, 2012

Recently Adopted Accounting Standards [Abstract]

Recently Adopted Accounting Standards

1. The Monarch Cement Company (Monarch) is principally engaged in the manufacture and sale of portland cement. The marketing area for Monarch's products consists primarily of the State of Kansas, the State of Iowa, southeast Nebraska, western Missouri, northwest Arkansas and northern Oklahoma. Sales are made primarily to contractors, ready-mixed concrete plants, concrete products plants, building materials dealers and governmental agencies. Subsidiaries of Monarch (which together with Monarch are referred to herein as the "Company") sell ready-mixed concrete, concrete products and sundry building materials within Monarch's marketing area.

For a summary of accounting policies, the reader should refer to Note 1 of the consolidated financial statements included in our Company's most recent annual report on Form 10-K.

Recently Adopted Accounting Standards

In September 2011, the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) issued Accounting Standards Update (ASU) No. 2011-08, "Intangibles - Goodwill and Other (Topic 350): Testing Goodwill for Impairment" which allows entities to first assess qualitative factors to determine whether events and circumstances lead to the conclusion that it is necessary to perform the two-step goodwill impairment test currently required under Topic 350, Intangible - Goodwill and Other. Currently, Topic 350 requires entities to test goodwill on an annual basis by comparing the fair value of a reporting unit to its carrying value including goodwill (Step 1). The second part of the test must be performed to measure the amount of impairment. Under ASU No. 2011-08, entities are not required to calculate the fair value of a reporting unit unless they conclude that it is more likely than not that the unit's carrying value is greater than its fair value based on an assessment of events and circumstances. Entities may bypass the qualitative assessment during any reporting period. The Company elected to early adopt in December 2011 prior to the normal effective date of January 1, 2012. The ASU did not have a material impact on our consolidated financial statements.

In May 2011, the FASB issued ASU No. 2011-04, "Fair Value Measurement - Amendments to Achieve Common Fair Value Measurement and Disclosure Requirements in U.S. GAAP and IFRS", which updated the guidance in ASC Topic 820. The amendments in this ASU result in common principles and requirements for measuring fair value and for disclosing information about fair value measurements in accordance with U.S. GAAP and International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). The amendments change the wording used to describe many of the requirements in U.S. GAAP for measuring fair value and for disclosing information about fair value measurements to ensure that U.S. GAAP and IFRS fair value measurement and disclosure requirements are described in the same way. The ASU also provides for certain changes in current GAAP disclosure requirements, for example with respect to the measurement of Level 3 assets and for measuring the fair value of an instrument classified in a reporting entity's shareholders' equity. The amendments in this update are to be applied prospectively. This guidance became effective for the Company beginning January 1, 2012 and did not have a material impact on our consolidated financial statements.

New Accounting Standards Issued But Not Yet Adopted

There are currently no accounting standards that have been issued and not yet adopted by the Company that are expected to have a significant impact on the Company's financial position, results of operations and cash flows upon adoption.