Facebook has revealed a little more about what compelled it to spend close to $19 billion earlier this year to buy mobile messaging service WhatsApp — a deal that had many scratching their heads at the huge sum.

Roughly $15.3 billion of the price Facebook paid is attributed to “goodwill,” according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission made on Tuesday.

Goodwill, in business accounting parlance, generally refers to the excess in the purchase price of a company that cannot be attributed to any income producing businesses or tangible assets. In this case, it seems to represent what Facebook deems to be WhatsApp’s potential future value.

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