FOR PROFESSOR JIM -- Assignment 2: Annual Report Review

Assignment 2: Annual Report Review 

Due Week 6, Day 7 (225 points) The specific course learning outcomes associated with this assignment are:

This project requires that you conduct a financial analysis of two, comparable organizations. You may select any organizations that produce publicly available financial statements employing IFRS or U.S. GAAP (both companies must follow the same GAAP). Let your professor know which two companies you plan to study before the end of Week 2, as your selection must be approved. The professor reserves the right to limit the number of students comparing the same two organizations.

Assignment:

1.Carefully review the annual reports for both organizations. Comment on what approach each company has taken in reporting to its shareholders. (This requirement is purposely broad to give you the freedom to talk about anything that comes under the broad title of “reporting to shareholders”).

2.Prepare a ratio analysis for both companies including a trend analysis for three years. Comment on the significance of the ratios for each company (do they indicate that things are all right, do they suggest that problems exist, or is it likely that problems will occur in the future?). Comment specifically on the similarities and differences among the ratios calculated for both companies and comparison to any benchmark.

3.Prepare an analysis of the cash flow statements for both companies.

4.List and discuss the importance of the two most significant accounting policies adopted

by the two organizations (you should select the same two policies for both organizations). Explain the options selected by both companies and comment on any differences that you see. Explain what other policies the organizations could have selected and state why you think they selected one policy over another.

5.Provide the URL’s for each company’s Annual Report. Your assignment should adhere to these guidelines:

•Write in a logical, well-organized conventional business style. Use Times New Roman font size 12 or similar, double space, and leave ample white space per page.

•All references must follow JWMI style guide and works must be cited appropriately. Check with your professor for any additional instructions on citations.

•On the first page or in a header, include the title of the assignment, the student’s name, the professor’s name, the course title, and the date. Reference pages are not included in the assignment page length.

•Faculty members have discretion to penalize for assignments that do not follow these guidelines. Check with your individual professor if you feel the assignment requires a much longer or shorter treatment than recommended.

I have also attached the course guide that gives clear expectations for Assignment 2 (pages 17 and 18), an excel template provided by my professor, a sample professional paper for formatting the Word document, and additional notes outlining the requirements for this assignment are below.

Please pay special attention to the grading rubic for this assignment (page 18) in the course guide. Thank you!

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Step 1 - print out the first tab's two pages & make notes on what the ratio analyses mean to you. You can type directly into the 'notes' cells, but all other cells are password protected.

Step 2 - key four years worth of selected financial data for each company into the data tab.  Type each company's name in the cells provided at the top.  If you are not using 2009-2012 financial data, replace those years with the ones you are using.  Only the shaded cells are available; all other cells are password protected. 

Step 3 - Print out tab #3....which contains selected financial ratios from pages 380-381.  These selected analyses are the minimum you should review and discuss.  Please include a few other ratios/analyses in the paper that you believe are important -- As you know, going a little beyond makes the difference between A's and B's.

NOTE 2:  Remember to keep the tone of your paper professional, objective, and factual.  Do Not use first person (I, me, we, you, your, etc).  Provide citations for your facts and resources.  

Instead of...   As you can see in Appendix 1, Company A has a better Earnings Per Share. This tells us that... 

Reword as...    Appendix 1 contains the Earnings Per Share data. Based on the discussion of this financial ratio in Lecture ### (JWMI citation), it is apparent that Company A's trend has..... while Company B's trend has....   One potential result of these trends is that the investors of Company.....

NOTE 3:  Use the Rubric's grading criteria as a guide for creating your section headings. This way, you will not accidentally forget to cover a topic and the reader(s) of your paper do not have to hunt for your required topics.

NOTE 4:  The body of your paper should be about 8-12 pages in length.  In addition to the body of your paper, you should also have (a) Title Page, (b) Abstract (or Executive Summary) page, and (c) Reference pages.

jwmi_530_course_guide.pdf

sample_for_assignment_2-financial_analysis_spreadsheet.xlsx

sample_professional_paper_jan_2014.doc

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Additional Notes from my professor:

Assignment 2 requires both the worksheet (showing the ratio calculations) and a written report/analysis.   The write up should follow the standard JWMI formal paper guidelines (eg including summary/conclusion, references, etc) and likely will be about 8-12 pages in length.   

Of note, in the paper, you do NOT need to discuss every ratio -- pick the top/most significant ratios (perhaps 5-6) and discuss what they mean, how the companies are doing (good/bad, improving/declining), and how they compare and contrast with each other.

Be sure to include Cash Flow is a discussion section in the paper (worth 20% of the grade!).  As with the ratios, discuss how the companies are doing and how they compare/contrast with each other.   Additionally, describe how the Company's strategic choices and operating approach are playing out in the Cash Flow statement (eg financing (especially debt) choices, acquisition strategy, asset investment, etc).

** I also have a kaltura video from my professor, let me know if you would like that as well. 

Thanks,

GottagetanA