Chapter 3 - Financial Statement Analysis
Chapter 3 - Financial Statement Analysis
Financial statement analysis is the process of analyzing a company's financial statements for decision -making purposes.
External users use this to assess and evaluate the financial performance, business value, and over -all condition of the
organization.
The main objective of financial statement analysis is to provide information about the financial position, performance
and changes in financial position of a company that is useful to a wide range of users in making economic decisions. By
examining the past and current financial data, investors can evaluate a company’s performance and financial position as
well as assessing risks. Financial statement analysis yields valuable information about trends and relationships, the
quality of a company's earnings, and the strengths and weaknesses of its financial position.
• Horizontal Analysis is the comparison of financial information over a series of reporting periods.
○ Comparative Analysis. In the field of accounting, it has been a requirement by the GAAP to present
comparative statements for the current year and the previous year. This facilitates comparison of the
company's financial position and results of operation.
In Comparative Analysis, the balance of the accounts in the financial statements of the previous year is
subtracted from the current year. This would result to a change, either a growth or a reduction.
○ Trend Analysis. Under this method, the percentage changes are determined for several successive periods
instead of the typical two-year period horizontal analysis.
In computing the trend, the base period (usually the oldest year) amounts are written as 100%. The
percentage relationship of each account in the statements is then computed by dividing each amount by
the base year figure.
• Vertical analysis or Common-size statement analysis is the proportional analysis of a financial statement, where
each line item on a financial statement is listed as a percentage of another item. Every line item on an income
statement is stated as a percentage of net sales, while every line item on a balance sheet is stated as a
percentage of total assets.
The horizontal analysis is using two (2) periods (for comparative) and three (3) or more periods (for trend) in
analyzing the financial statements while the vertical analysis use only one (1) period of financial statement.
In vertical analysis, each account figure is divided by the base figure. It presents the relative size of an account or
item in proportion to the whole (which is the base).
Base for:
Income Statement = net sales
Balance Sheet = total assets
% of change =
(30,000/195,000) * 100
Proportional % =
(225,000/221,160) * 100
Trend % =
(28,857/24,088) * 100
The base year is usually the oldest year, however, any year could be the base year upon the discretion of the
management. Please note that if the problem is silent about the base year, we will assume that the base year is the
oldest year. In the case of the example above, the base year is year 2006.
References:
Fundamentals of Financial Management by Ma. Flordeliza L. Anastacio
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/f/financial-statement-analysis.asp
https://www.accountingtools.com/articles/2017/5/14/financial -statement-analysis
http://professoroffice.com/