CHAPTERS 18-19 Flashcards
Profitability
The ability of the business to earn profit, as compared against a base, such as Sales, assets or owners equity.
Liquidity
The ability of the business to meet its short-term debts as they fall due.
Efficiency
The ability of the business to manage its assets and liabilities.
Stability
The ability of the business to meet its debts and continue its Operations in the long term.
Analysing
examining the financial reports in detail to identify changes or differences in performance
Interpreting
examining the relationships between the items in the financial reports in order to explain the cause and effect of changes or differences in performance
What does business survival depend on
Business survival depends on having both satisfactory profitability and satisfactory liquidity. A profitable business will still fail if it cannot pay its debts.
Firms ability to earn profit is dependent on
earning revenue and controlling expenses.
Per dollar vs total
A firm with more assets is likely to generate a much larger profit than a firm with much less assets. Comparing these firms on the basis of profit alone will only tell us that one firm had more assets to use. However, if the profit was expressed per dollar of assets, a comparison of the ability of each firm to earn profit if it had the same asset base would be possible, showing which was more profitable.
4 tools for assessing profitability
- trends
- variances
- benchmarks
- profitability indicators.
Trends
the pattern formed by changes in an item over a number of periods
Benchmarks
In terms of profit and profitability, it is impossible to say whether a result is satisfactory without reference to a of some sort. A benchmark is an acceptable standard against which the firm’s actual performance can be assessed.
3 benchmarks
Previous periods
Budgeted performance
Other firms
Previous period benchmark
This allows for the preparation of a horizontal analysis and identification of trends. Using this benchmark enables an assessment of whether profitability has improved or worsened from one period to the next.
Budgeted performance benchmark
Budgeted performance for the current year. This allows for the preparation of a variance report, and enables an assessment of whether profitability was satisfactory or unsatisfactory in terms of meeting the firm goals/expectations.
Other firms benchmark
This is sometimes expressed as an’industry average. It allows the firm performance to be compared against other firms operating under similar conditions. This is sometimes known as an ‘inter-firm comparison.
Profitability indicators
These indicators express an element of profit in re/ation to some other aspect of business performance. As a result, differences in profitability between years and also between businesses can be assessed, as the indicator expresses profitability according to a common base.
5 profitability indicators
ROI ROA ATO NPM GPM
ROI
From an investor’s point of view, the main measure of profitability is rerun on owners investment, which measures the profit (return) earned per dollar of capital invested by the owner. As a result, it indicates how effectively the business has used the owner’s funds to earn profit, which is useful in helping the owner to decide between alternative investments.
ROI formula
Net profit/average capital *100
DR
A stability indicator. The debt ratio measures the percentage of a firm’s assets that are financed by liabilities, and thus indicates the extent to which the business is reliant on liabilities/ debt (rather than owner’s capital) to purchase its assets.
Debt ratio formula
Total liabilities/total assets *100
High debt ratio
Debt ratio and risk
A high Debt Ratio means a greater reliance on borrowed funds (liabilities) to purchase assets and, consequently, a lower reliance on funds contributed by the owner. This will have implications for the firm’s profitability, and its Return on Owner’s Investment. However, the Debt Ratio is also a measure of the firm’s long-term stability, and can be used to evaluate the level of risk.
Asset the debt ratio in isolation?
However, the Debt Ratio cannot be assessed in isolation: it should be assessed in conjunction with the Return on Owner’s Investment.
Discuss a Higher debt ratio
A higher Debt Ratio means the firm is more heavily reliant on borrowed funds than it is on the owners capital, and this is one way of increasing the Return on Owner’s Investment without actually increasing profit. With a higher Debt Ratio, the business is using someone else’s funds to buy the assets to earn profit, but the owner still receives all that profit.
However, a higher Debt Ratio means there is a higher risk that the business will be unable to repay its debts and meet the interest payments. Further, interest rate rises could have a significant impact on profit and cash as the business is carrying so much debt.
Lower debt ratio
On the other hand, a low Debt Ratio means the firm is not very reliant on borrowed funds, and is therefore at relatively low risk of being unable to repay its debts. However, it also means that most of the finance used to purchase assets has come from the funds of the owner, and as the owner has had to contribute more personal funds, a lower Return on Owner’s Investment will ensue.
Ideal debt ratio
The owner must judge carefully so that the Debt Ratio is high enough to maximise the Return on Owner’s Investment, but not too high that it will create difficulties for the business in relation to its debt burden.
ROA
Whereas Return on Owner’s Investment assesses profitability from an investor’s point of view, assesses profitability from a manager’s point of view. Specifically, it measures Net Profit per dollar of assets controlled by the business. As a result, it indicates how effectively the firm has used its assets to earn profit.
ROA formula
Net profit/average total assets *100
ROI AND ROA
As many small business owners are both investors and managers, they will need to look at both the Return on Owner’s Investment and the Return on Assets when assessing profitability. One thing they will notice is that the Return on Owner’s Investment will always be higher than the Return on Assets. This is because owner’s equity will always be lower (or the same) than total assets
Cnages in roa if assets change
If assets increase, and Net Profit increases
by a smaller proportion, then the Return on Assets will fall, indicating deteriorating profitability. On the other hand, if Net Profit increases by more than assets, the Return on Assets will rise, indicating improved profitability.
Changes to roa if assets don’t change
Therefore, assuming assets do not change, an improvement in the Return on Assets may be the result of an improved ability to earn revenue or better expense control, or both. A deterioration in the Return on Assets would, of course, be caused by the opposite. Either way, the Return on Assets will depend heavily on the firm’s ability to earn revenue and control its expenses,
AT
Asset Turnover indicates how efficiently the firm has used it assets to generate revenue. As earning revenue is key to earning profit therefore, AT will have a significant effect on profitability. This indicator measures the number of times in a period the value of assets is earned as Sales revenue: the higher the Asset Turnover, the more capable the firm is of using its assets to earn revenue.
At formula
Sales/average total assets
AT AND ROA
The similarity between AT and the ROA reflects the fact that they both assess the firm’s ability to use its assets; the only difference being that ROA relates to profit, whereas AT relates only to revenue. Theoretically, an increase in AT (meaning an increased ability to earn Sales revenue) should mean an increase in the ROA, and increased Net Profit. However, this is not always the case.
Expense control
The firm’s ability to manage its expenses so that they either decrease or in the case of variable expenses increase no faster than Sales revenue. 2 indicators used to evaluate expense control are NPM and GPM.
NPM
The net profit margin measures the percentage of Sales revenue that is retained as Net Profit. Put another way it measures how much of each dollar of Sales revenue remains as Net Profit after expenses are deducted. As a result it is a good indicator of expense control.
NPM formula
Net profit/sales revenue*100
NPM, AT AND ROA
The ability of a firm to use its assets to earn profit depends on its ability both to earn revenue and to control its expenses. AT measures the ability of the firm to use its assets to earn revenue. NPM measures the ability of the firm to control its expenses and retain Sales revenue as Net Profit. Thus ROA depends on both the Asset Turnover and the Net Profit Margin.
What does roa and profitability depend on
Return on Assets, and therefore profitability depends on the ability of the firm to use its assets to earn revenue (as measured by Asset Turnover) and to control its expenses (as measured by the Net Profit Margin).
GPM
Gross profit margin measures the percentage of Sales revenue that is retained as Gross Profit. Gross Profit is the difference between Sales revenue and Cost of Goods Sold and is used to assess the adequacy of the firm’s mark-up: the difference between the selling price and the cost price of its stock. The GPM can be used to assess the average mark-up on all goods sold during a particular period.
4 limitations of financial indicators
. the reports use HISTORICAL DATA - they do not guarantee what will happen in the future
. many indicators rely on AVERAGES, and this may conceal details about individual items
. firms use different accounting methods, which can undermine the COMPARABILITY of the reports, and profitability indicators
. the reports contain LIMITED INFORMATION: there are many items of information simply not reported in an Income Statement.