Tekst Financial Analysis

34 important questions on Tekst Financial Analysis

What do ratio analysis assess?

Ratio analysis involves assessing how various line items in a firm's financial statements relate to one another. 

What does cash flow analysis allow the analyst to examine?

Cash flow analysis allows the analyst to examine the firm's liquidity, and how the firm is managing its operating investment, and financing cash flows. 

What are the four levers managers can use to achieve their growth and profit targets?

1. operating management
2. investment management
3. financing strategy
4. dividend policies
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By which two factors is a company's ROE affected?

1. How profitably it employs it assets
2. How big the firm's asset base is relative to shareholders' investment

What does financial leverage indicates?

Financial leverage indicates how many euro of assets the firm is able to deploy for each euro invested by its shareholders. 

How can the Return of Assets (ROA) itself be decomposed as a product of two factors?

ROA = 
Net profit    x  Sales
Sales                Assets

What does the profit margin (Return On Sales) indicates?

The profit margin ratio indicates how much the company is able to keep as profits for each euro of sales its makes.

What are marketable securities?

Very liquid securities that can be converted into cash quickly at a reasonable price. Marketable securities are very liquid as they tend to have maturities of less than one year. Furthermore, the rate at which these securities can be bought or sold has little effect on their prices. Examples of marketable securities include commercial paper, banker's acceptances, Treasury bills and other money market instruments. A marketable security is a near-cash (liquid) asset and is recorded at acquisition cost (purchase price plus incidentals, commissions, and taxes) or market value (whichever is lower) in the account books under current assets.

What does Operating ROA measure?

Operating ROA is a measure of how profitably a company is able to deploy its operating assets to generate operating profits. 

What is the NOPAT margin a measure of?

NOPAT margin is a measure of how profitable a company's sales are from an operating perspective. 

What does the Operating asset turnover measure?

Operating asset turnover measures the extent to which a company is able to use its operating assets to generate sales. 

By which two factors is the gross margin influenced?

  1. price premium that a firm's products or services command in the marketplace. The price premium is influenced by the degree of competition and the extent to which its products are unique. 
  2. efficiency of the firm's procurement and production process. 

Name expenses by nature of expense

Expenses are disclosed according to their nature such as depreciation, transports costs, rent expense, wages and salaries etc.

What are the two primary areas of asset management?

  1. working capital management
  2. management of non current assets

What is the definition of operating working capital?

(Current assets - cash and marketable securities) minus (current liabilities - current debt and notes payable)

What does the operating working capital turnover indicates?

Operating working capital turnover indicates how many euros of sales a firm is able to generate for each euro invested in its operating working capital.

Trade payable turnover

Purchases             or    Cost of sales    or   Cost of materials
Trade payables             Trade payables       Trade payables

Non-current assets generally consist of 

Net property, plan and equipment (PP&E), intangible assets such as goodwill, and other assets.

The efficiency with which a firm uses its net non=current assets is measured by two ratios

Net non-current assets as a percent of sales.
Net non-current assets turnover =
Sales                               
Net non-current assets

Property, plant and equipment (PP&E) is the most important non-current asset in a firm's balance sheet. The efficiency with thick a firms PP&E is used is measured by

The ratio of PP&E to sales or by the PP&E turnover ratio.
PP&E turnover ratio =
Sales                                                   
Net property, plans and equipment

How do minority investments following the equity method impact net operating asset turnover?

Minority investments that are accounted for using the equity method reduce net operating asset turnover because equity income from these unconsolidated subsidiaries is directly included in investment income. 

How can financial leverage increases a firm's ROE?

Financial leverage increases a firm's ROE as long as the cost of the liabilities is less than the return from investing these funds. While financial leverage can potentially benefit a firm's shareholders, it can also increase their risk. Unlike equity, liabilities have predefined payment terms, and the firm faces risk of financial distress if it fails to meet these commitments. 

Which ratios attempt to measure the firm's ability to repay its current liabilities?

Current Ratio, Quick Ratio, Cash Ratio and Operating cash flow ratio

When does a firm rely primarily on equity financing?

If a firm's operating cash flows are highly volatile and its capital expenditure needs are unpredictable, it may have to rely primarily on equity financing. 

Net debt to net capital ratio

Interest bearing liabilities - cash and marketable securities
Interest bearing liabilities - cash and marketable securities + Shareholders' equity

What does debt to equity ratio provide on explanation?

The ratio provides an indication of how many euros of debt financing the firm is using for each euro invested by its shareholders. 

What is an indication of the degree of risk associated with its debt policy?

The ease with which a firm can meet its interest payments is an indication of the degree of risk with its debt policy. The interest coverage rate provides   a measure of this construct.

What does the coverage ratio tell a firm?

A coverage ratio of one implies that the firm is barely covering its interest expense though its operating activities, which is a very risky situation. The larger the coverage ratio, the greater the cushion the firm has to meet interest obligations. 

Analysts often use the concept of sustainable growth as a way to evaluate a firm's ratios in a comprehensive manner. A firm's sustainable growth rate is defined as?

ROE x (1-Dividend payout ratio)

What does the sustainable growth rate tell a firm?

Sustainable growth rate is he rate at which a firm an grow while keeping its profitability and financial policies unchanged.The sustainable growth rate provides a bench mark against which a firm's growth can be evaluated. If the firm intends to grow at a higher rate than its sustainable growth rate, one could assess which of the ratios are likely to change in the process. 

In the reported cash flow statements firms classify their cash flows into three categories.

  1. cash flow from operations - cash generated by the firm from the sale of goods and services after paying for the cost of inputs and operations. 
  2. cash flow related to investments - shows the cash paid for capital expenditures, inter corporate investments, acquisitions and cash received from the sales of non current assets.
  3. cash flow related to financing activities - cash raised from (or paid to) the firm's shareholders and debt holders. 

Cash from operations an be calculated as follows

Working capital from operations
- Increase (+ decrease) in trade receivables
- Increase (+ decrease) in inventories
- Increase (+ decrease) in other current assets excluding cash and cash equivalents
+ Increase (- decrease) in trade payables
+ Increase (- decrease) in other current liabilities excl. debt

To compute the cash flow starting with a firm's net profit, an analyst adds back three types of items

  1. after-tax net interest expenses because this is a financing item that will be considered later
  2. non-operating gains or losses typically arising out of asset disposals or asset write-offs because these items are investment related and will be considered later
  3. non-current operating accruals such as depreciation and deferred taxes because these are non cash operating charges

In interpreting firms' cash flow from operations after working capital, it is important to keep in mind 

their growth strategy, industry characteristics, and credit policies.

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