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Chapter 24: Question 4P-c (page 1452)

(Horizontal and Vertical Analysis) Presented below is the comparative balance sheet for Gilmour Company.

GILMOUR COMPANY

COMPARATIVE BALANCE SHEET

AS OF DECEMBER 31, 2018 AND 2017

December 31

2018

2017

Assets

Cash

\( 180,000

\) 275,000

Accounts receivable (net)

220,000

155,000

Short-term investments

270,000

150,000

Inventories

1,060,000

980,000

Prepaid expenses

25,000

25,000

Plant & equipment

2,585,000

1,950,000

Accumulated depreciation

(1,000,000)

(750,000)

\(3,340,000

(2,785,000)

Liabilities and Stockholders’ Equity

Accounts payable

\) 50,000

\( 75,000

Accrued expenses

170,000

200,000

Bonds payable

450,000

190,000

Common stock

2,100,000

1,770,000

Retained earnings

570,000

550,000

\)3,340,000

(2,785,000)

Instructions

(Round to two decimal places.)

  1. Of what value is the additional information provided in part (a)?

Short Answer

Expert verified

Assets, liabilities, and stockholders, equity decreases on a common basis, resulting in breaking the statement down into figures that are easier to understand.

Step by step solution

01

Meaning of Horizontal Analysis

Horizontal analysis is the comparison of income, assets, and other financial data of an individual or company for two or more time periods. This analysis is a technique for examining a company's financial records.

02

Determining the value, which is the additional information provided in part (a)

Part (a) provided that the component percentage (common size) balance sheet allows for a more straightforward examination. Total assets, total liabilities, and shareholders' equity are all reduced on a common basis. As a result, the statement is broken down into statistics that are easier to understand.

For example, management may assume that 6.59 percent of accounts receivable is a low figure. Perhaps the corporation is not giving enough credit. The increase in the ratio of bonds payable to 13.47 percent from 6.82 percent reflects increasing leverage, which could have a detrimental effect on a company's ability to pay its debts and its long-term stability.

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Most popular questions from this chapter

Picasso Company is a wholesale distributor of packaging equipment and supplies. The company’s sales have averaged about \(900,000 annually for the 3-year period 2015–2017. The firm’s total assets at the end of 2017 amounted to \)850,000.

The president of Picasso Company has asked the controller to prepare a report that summarizes the financial aspects of the company’s operations for the past 3 years. This report will be presented to the board of directors at their next meeting.

In addition to comparative financial statements, the controller has decided to present a number of relevant financial ratios which can assist in the identification and interpretation of trends. At the request of the controller, the accounting staff has calculated the following ratios for the 3-year period 2015–2017.

2015

2016

2017

Current ratio

1.80

1.89

1.96

Acid-test (quick) ratio

1.04

0.99

0.87

Accounts receivable turnover

8.75

7.71

6.42

Inventory turnover

4.91

4.32

3.42

Debt to assets ratio

51.0%

46.0%

41.0%

Long-term debt to assets ratio

31.0%

27.0%

24.0%

Sales to fixed assets (fixed asset turnover)

1.58

1.69

1.79

Sales as a percent of 2015 sales

1.00

1.03

1.07

Gross margin percentage

36.0%

35.1%

34.6%

Net income to sales

6.9%

7.0%

7.2%

Return on assets

7.7%

7.7%

7.8%

Return on common stockholders’ equity

13.6%

13.1%

12.7%

In preparation of the report, the controller has decided first to examine the financial ratios independent of any other data to determine if the ratios themselves reveal any significant trends over the 3-year period.

Instructions

a) The current ratio is increasing while the acid-test (quick) ratio is decreasing. Using the ratios provided, identify and explain the contributing factor(s) for this apparently divergent trend.

What approaches have been suggested to overcome the seasonality problem related to interim reporting?

The following statement is an excerpt from the FASB pronouncement related to interim reporting. Interim financial information is essential to provide investors and others with timely information as to the progress of the enterprise. The usefulness of such information rests on the relationship that it has to the annual results of operations. Accordingly, the Board has concluded that each interim period should be viewed primarily as an integral part of an annual period. In general, the results for each interim period should be based on the accounting principles and practices used by an enterprise in the preparation of its latest annual financial statements unless a change in an accounting practice or policy has been adopted in the current year. The Board has concluded, however, that certain accounting principles and practices followed for annual reporting purposes may require modification at interim reporting dates so that the reported results for the interim period may better relate to the results of operations for the annual period.

Instructions

The following six independent cases present how accounting facts might be reported on an individual company’s interim financial reports. For each of these cases, state whether the method proposed to be used for interim reporting would be acceptable under generally accepted accounting principles applicable to interim financial data. Support each answer with a brief explanation.

f) LaBrava Company was reasonably certain it would have an employee strike in the third quarter. As a result, it shipped heavily during the second quarter but plans to defer the recognition of the sales in excess of the normal sales volume. The deferred sales will be recognized as sales in the third quarter when the strike is in progress. LaBrava Company management thinks this is more representative of normal second- and third-quarter operations.

What is the difference between a CPA’s unqualified opinion or “clean” opinion and a qualified one?

Snider Corporation, a publicly-traded company, is preparing the interim financial data which it will issue to its shareholders at the end of the first quarter of the 2017–2018 fiscal year. Snider’s financial accounting department has compiled the following summarized revenue and expense data for the first quarter of the year.

Sales revenue \(60,000,000

Cost of goods sold 36,000,000

Variable selling expenses 1,000,000

Fixed selling expenses 3,000,000

Included in the fixed selling expenses was the single lump-sum payment of \)2,000,000 for television advertisements for the entire year.

Instructions

b) What financial information, as a minimum, must Snider Corporation disclose to its shareholders in its quarterly reports?

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