Financial statement analysis

Financial statement analysis (or financial analysis) refers to an assessment of the viability, stability and profitability of a business, sub-business or project.

It is performed by professionals who prepare reports using ratios that make use of information taken from financial statements and other reports. These reports are usually presented to top management as one of their bases in making business decisions. Based on these reports, management may:

Continue or discontinue its main operation or part of its business;

Make or purchase certain materials in the manufacture of its product;

Acquire or rent/lease certain machineries and equipment in the production of its goods;

Issue stocks or negotiate for a bank loan to increase its working capital;

Make decisions regarding investing or lending capital;

Other decisions that allow management to make an informed selection on various alternatives in the conduct of its business.

Goals

Financial analysts often assess the firm's:

1. Profitability - its ability to earn income and sustain growth in both short-term and long-term. A company's degree of profitability is usually based on the income statement, which reports on the company's results of operations;

2. Solvency - its ability to pay its obligation to creditors and other third parties in the long-term;

3. Liquidity - its ability to maintain positive cash flow, while satisfying immediate obligations;

Both 2 and 3 are based on the company's balance sheet, which indicates the financial condition of a business as of a given point in time.

4. Stability- the firm's ability to remain in business in the long run, without having to sustain significant losses in the conduct of its business. Assessing a company's stability requires the use of both the income statement and the balance sheet, as well as other financial and non-financial indicators.

Methods

Financial analysts often compare financial ratios (of solvency, profitability, growth, etc.):

Past Performance - Across historical time periods for the same firm (the last 5 years for example),

Future Performance - Using historical figures and certain mathematical and statistical techniques, including present and future values, This extrapolation method is the main source of errors in financial analysis as past statistics can be poor predictors of future prospects.

Comparative Performance - Comparison between similar firms.

These ratios are calculated by dividing a (group of) account balance(s), taken from the balance sheet and / or the income statement, by another, for example :

n / equity =ROE

Net income / total assets = return on assets

Stock price / earnings per share = P/E-ratio

Comparing financial ratios is merely one way of conducting financial analysis. Financial ratios face several theoretical challenges:

They say little about the firm's prospects in an absolute sense. Their insights about relative performance require a reference point from other time periods or similar firms.

One ratio holds little meaning. As indicators, ratios can be logically interpreted in at least two ways. One can partially overcome this problem by combining several related ratios to paint a more comprehensive picture of the firm's performance.

Seasonal factors may prevent year-end values from being representative. A ratio's values may be distorted as account balances change from the beginning to the end of an accounting period. Use average values for such accounts whenever possible.

Financial ratios are no more objective than the accounting methods employed. Changes in accounting policies or choices can yield drastically different ratio values.

They fail to account for exogenous factors like investor behavior that are not based upon economic fundamentals of the firm or the general economy (fundamental analysis) .

Financial analysts can also use percentage analysis which involves reducing a series of figures as a percentage of some base amount. For example, a group of items can be expressed as a percentage of net income. When proportionate changes in the same figure over a given time period expressed as a percentage is known as horizontal analysis. Vertical or common-size analysis, reduces all items on a statement to a “common size” as a percentage of some base value which assists in comparability with other companies of different sizes .

Another method is comparative analysis. This provides a better way to determine trends. Comparative analysis presents the same information for two or more time periods and is presented side-by-side to allow for easy analysis.

See also

Fundamental analysis

Business valuation

(source:wikipedia)

Fundamental analysis

Fundamental analysis of a business involves analyzing its financial statements and health, its management and competitive advantages, and its competitors and markets. When applied to futures and forex, it focuses on the overall state of the economy, interest rates, production, earnings, and management. When analyzing a stock, futures contract, or currency using fundamental analysis there are two basic approaches one can use; bottom up analysis and top down analysis. The term is used to distinguish such analysis from other types of investment analysis, such as quantitative analysis and technical analysis.

Fundamental analysis is performed on historical and present data, but with the goal of making financial forecasts. There are several possible objectives:

to conduct a company stock valuation and predict its probable price evolution,

to make a projection on its business performance,

to evaluate its management and make internal business decisions,

to calculate its credit risk.

Two analytical models

When the objective of the analysis is to determine what stock to buy and at what price, there are two basic methodologies

Fundamental analysis maintains that markets may misprice a security in the short run but that the "correct" price will eventually be reached. Profits can be made by trading the mispriced security and then waiting for the market to recognize its "mistake" and reprice the security.

Technical analysis maintains that all information is reflected already in the stock price. Trends 'are your friend' and sentiment changes predate and predict trend changes. Investors' emotional responses to price movements lead to recognizable price chart patterns. Technical analysis does not care what the 'value' of a stock is. Their price predictions are only extrapolations from historical price patterns.

Investors can use any or all of these different but somewhat complementary methods for stock picking. For example many fundamental investors use technicals for deciding entry and exit points. Many technical investors use fundamentals to limit their universe of possible stock to 'good' companies.

The choice of stock analysis is determined by the investor's belief in the different paradigms for "how the stock market works". See the discussions at efficient-market hypothesis, random walk hypothesis, capital asset pricing model, Fed model Theory of Equity Valuation, Market-based valuation, and Behavioral finance.

Fundamental analysis includes:

Economic analysis

Industry analysis

Company analysis

On the basis of these three analyses the intrinsic value of the shares are determined. This is considered as the true value of the share. If the intrinsic value is higher than the market price it is recommended to buy the share . If it is equal to market price hold the share and if it is less than the market price sell the shares.

Use by different portfolio styles

Investors may use fundamental analysis within different portfolio management styles.

Buy and hold investors believe that latching onto good businesses allows the investor's asset to grow with the business. Fundamental analysis lets them find 'good' companies, so they lower their risk and probability of wipe-out.

Managers may use fundamental analysis to correctly value 'good' and 'bad' companies. Eventually 'bad' companies' stock goes up and down, creating opportunities for profits.

Managers may also consider the economic cycle in determining whether conditions are 'right' to buy fundamentally suitable companies.

Contrarian investors distinguish "in the short run, the market is a voting machine, not a weighing machine". Fundamental analysis allows you to make your own decision on value, and ignore the market.

Value investors restrict their attention to under-valued companies, believing that 'it's hard to fall out of a ditch'. The value comes from fundamental analysis.

Managers may use fundamental analysis to determine future growth rates for buying high priced growth stocks.

Managers may also include fundamental factors along with technical factors into computer models (quantitative analysis).

Top-down and bottom-up

Investors can use either a top-down or bottom-up approach.

The top-down investor starts his analysis with global economics, including both international and national economic indicators, such as GDP growth rates, inflation, interest rates, exchange rates, productivity, and energy prices. He narrows his search down to regional/industry analysis of total sales, price levels, the effects of competing products, foreign competition, and entry or exit from the industry. Only then he narrows his search to the best business in that area.

The bottom-up investor starts with specific businesses, regardless of their industry/region.

Procedures

The analysis of a business' health starts with financial statement analysis that includes ratios. It looks at dividends paid, operating cash flow, new equity issues and capital financing. The earnings estimates and growth rate projections published widely by Thomson Reuters and others can be considered either 'fundamental' (they are facts) or 'technical' (they are investor sentiment) based on your perception of their validity.

The determined growth rates (of income and cash) and risk levels (to determine the discount rate) are used in various valuation models. The foremost is the discounted cash flow model, which calculates the present value of the future

dividends received by the investor, along with the eventual sale price. (Gordon model)

earnings of the company, or

cash flows of the company.

The amount of debt is also a major consideration in determining a company's health. It can be quickly assessed using the debt to equity ratio and the current ratio (current assets/current liabilities).

The simple model commonly used is the Price/Earnings ratio. Implicit in this model of a perpetual annuity (Time value of money) is that the 'flip' of the P/E is the discount rate appropriate to the risk of the business. The multiple accepted is adjusted for expected growth (that is not built into the model).

Growth estimates are incorporated into the PEG ratio, but the math does not hold up to analysis.[citation needed] Its validity depends on the length of time you think the growth will continue. IGAR models can be used to impute expected changes in growth from current P/E and historical growth rates for the stocks relative to a comparison index.

Computer modelling of stock prices has now replaced much of the subjective interpretation of fundamental data (along with technical data) in the industry. Since about year 2000, with the power of computers to crunch vast quantities of data, a new career has been invented. At some funds (called Quant Funds) the manager's decisions have been replaced by proprietary mathematical models.

Criticisms

Economists such as Burton Malkiel suggest that neither fundamental analysis nor technical analysis is useful in outperforming the markets.

(source;wikipedia)

Government revenue

Government revenue is revenue received by a government. Its opposite is government spending. Government revenue is an important part of fiscal policy.

Revenue may be from various taxes or non-tax revenue (such as revenue from government-owned corporations or sovereign wealth funds).

Revenue Collections for December Up over Last Year

Gov. Bob McDonnell announced Thursday that December revenue collections increased by 9.5 percent over the prior year when adjusted for the December 2009 one-time tax amnesty program.

This is the ninth month out of the last ten in which state revenue collections exceeded the previous year’s amount. It is the second month in a row in which year over year revenue growth was greater than nine percent.

The revenue increase was primarily driven by withholding (+3.9 percent), corporate income (+3.4 percent) and sales tax (+8.6 percent - adjusted for tax amnesty) collections. Adjusted for the accelerated sales tax program, total state revenues grew 4.1 percent through December, slightly lagging the economic-base forecast of 5.2 percent growth.

Because a number of factors can influence the flow of payments and monthly growth rates this time of the year, December and January receipts must be considered together to get a clearer picture of revenue growth.

Speaking about the latest revenue report, McDonnell notes, “In a tough economy we are beginning to see real signs of progress and recovery. We have added 67,900 net new jobs in the Commonwealth since last February, the third greatest amount nationally.

"We have just posted two months of back to back nine-percent revenue growth, in the midst of a string of nine out of the last ten months featuring increases in state revenue. These are positive demonstrations of economic progress.

"However, this is still a difficult and uncertain economy. Over 280,000 Virginians are still unemployed. Clearly there is much more work to be done before all Virginians can find the good work they deserve. That is why we are focused this session of the General Assembly on utilizing savings and reprioritizations in our state budget to invest in job-creating core functions of government like higher education, economic development, transportation and government reform.

"Progress is being made, but we still have a long ways to go before economic prosperity and vitality have truly returned to every corner of the Commonwealth.”