Off-balance-sheet exposure
Obligations that never reached the balance sheet: guarantees given for third parties, sureties, committed future purchases.
How to read the number
Leverage measured from the balance sheet does not see them, yet they would be paid out of the same cash.
When the metric lies
A guarantee given for a company outside the group perimeter falls due in full and at once. Until then it appears nowhere except the notes.
Also known as: off balance sheet items