Analyze and compare the financial reports and related information of two publicly quoted (listed) companies and express their findings in the form of a report to an identified user of accounting information.

Introduction

The purpose of this assessment is to enable students to obtain, analyze and compare the financial reports and related information of two publicly quoted (listed) companies and express their findings in the form of a report to an identified user of accounting information. A good financial analysis report requires a proper understanding (and reading) of the financial statements, their elements, the related terminology, working capital management, cost of capital, capital structure, and risk appraisal. The social-ethical investing (i.e., critical evaluation of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) disclosures in corporate communications, e.g., annual reports, Web sites, social media) should also be considered.

Details

Acting as a financial advisor or a potential investor (who is considering the purchase of shares in the company in question. The investor is looking for both income and capital growth and has a modest sum to invest in the company), you are required to select two major non-financial quoted companies from either:

Both companies should be in the same industry group, of similar size and should be working in the same market for which you will research, analyse and evaluate their consolidated financial results. You are required to produce a report evaluating the financial performance and position of these two companies as evidenced by their most recently published annual accounts.

You are advised to spend some time choosing your companies. Make sure you select two, which allows you to satisfy well the requirements of the assignment. Please note that it is not necessary for the companies you choose to be performing well; your task is to evaluate their performance and position objectively. Your report should include a comparison of the company’s most recently published annual report with that for the five previous years. Your report should also compare your subject company’s position and performance with that of one other comparable/competitor company, over the same period. Please note that an exact matching of year-ends is not required; it is acceptable to compare two companies even though one may have a December accounting year-end and the other a March accounting year-end.   

Your choice of a main company and an appropriate comparator company is an integral feature of the assignment and will not be commented on by the module tutor or lecturers in advance of the report’s submission.

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