what are discontinued operations 
in financial accounting discontinued operations refer to parts of a company s core business or product line that have been divested or shut down and which are reported separately from continuing operations on the income statement understanding discontinued operationsdiscontinued operations are listed separately on the income statement because it s important that investors can clearly distinguish the profits and cash flows of continuing operations from those activities that have ceased this distinction is especially useful when companies merge as parsing out which assets are being divested or folded gives a clearer picture of how a company will make money in the future on a company s income statement discontinued operations are segregated from continuing operations so that investors may see clearly what money is inflowing from current operations vs those that have ceased disclosure on income statements