Financial Times Guide to Using and Interpreting Company Accounts - Softcover

McKenzie, Wendy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0273630997 ISBN 13: 9780273630999

Publisher: Financial Times Management, 1998

Synopsis

This book explains how to read and use company accounts, by guiding the reader through the accounts and providing the tools to interpret them to help make better decisions. *Looks at the key components of company accounts and introduces basic analysis. *Shows how to use this knowledge day-to-day.

About this title

From the Back Cover

The non-financial manager's expert guide to corporate accounts.

* Don't just read corporate accounts: interpret them accurately, and use them to make the best possible decisions.
* How to use financial ratios — and what they don't tell you.
* Using financial analysis to understand your suppliers, customers, competitors, and acquisition targets.

Every senior manager should be able to understand company accounts, yet many find it a daunting task.

This book shows you how.

You'll discover what you'll find in a set of accounts, and how to analyze that information to discover how any company is performing. Wendy McKenzie walks you through a complete set of company accounts, explaining what you'll find, what the documents are trying to tell you, the judgments involved in preparing the documents, and key differences in accounting between the US, UK, and other countries.

You'll learn how to approach and structure your analysis, which ratios to use — and what the ratios don't tell you. Finally, you'll learn how to use the information you generate, to make decisions about suppliers, customers, competitors, and potential acquisition targets.

For non-financial managers who need to understand company accounts in order to make better decisions.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

INTRODUCTIONPREFACE TO THIS BOOK

If you have ever asked yourself these questions: "Is my income large enough to cover my costs?" "Can I afford to buy a better car?" "How much am I worth?"

then you have prepared accounts. Probably only mentally, and certainly not in any formal way. We all prepare accounts in one form or another. In essence company accounts are no different to the ones that we prepare for ourselves, even though the format is more complicated and formalized. Yet most people believe that company accounts are hard, if not impossible, to understand.

All senior managers should be able to understand and analyze company accounts. This book shows you how. It shows you what you will find in a set of accounts and how to analyze the data so that you understand how the company is performing. Although it is primarily concerned with UK accounts, it also discusses the major differences you would find in looking at accounts prepared in other countries.

The book is organized into three sections.

The first section answers the question "What information will I find in the accounts?". This shows you: what documents you will find, what these documents are trying to show you, the way these documents are prepared, the judgements involved in preparing these documents, the main differences between UK accounts and those prepared in other countries.

The second section answers the question "How do I analyse the accounts?" and works through a set of published accounts, from the engineering company IMI plc, to show you: the way to approach and structure the analysis, the ratios to use, what the ratios do and do not tell you.

The third section answers the question "How can I use my analysis?" by Iooking at four different applications: analyzing suppliers' accounts, analyzing customers' accounts, analyzing competitors' accounts, identifying the acquisition potential of a company.

Edition details

• Publisher: Financial Times Management
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0273630997
• ISBN 13: 9780273630999
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 284