when determining what operating costs can be reasonably covered a business may prefer to remove any one time or highly irregular financial transactions that may falsely inflate profit norms this creates a plan based on more common occurrences that can be anticipated 
disadvantages of underlying profiteach company has its own version of underlying profit taking the accounting profit and then making adjustments as it sees fit without clear guidelines on how to report underlying profit these figures cannot be relied on to compare different firms full freedom also means some of these calculations can be called into question on occasions firms exclude items that have a negative impact on gaap earnings over several quarters and then promote their underlying profit figure actively as if it is the only number that merits attention it is important for investors to recognize the difference between accounting profit and underlying profit and gain a solid understanding of how the latter was calculated companies will disclose this information in their financial statements using the underlying profit figure can come in handy alongside other financials when assessing whether to invest in a company that said approach with caution and be sure to determine exactly why certain expenses were ignored before taking the figure at face value 