Reading Financial Reports For Dummies, 3rd Edition

Learn to:

• Decipher the information in financial reports
• Get up-to-speed on the latest SEC and governmental regulatory changes
• Grasp the impact of corporate communications and current trends

Decipher financial reports? Easy.

Especially relevant in today's world of corporate scandals and new accounting laws, the numbers in a financial report contain vitally important information about where a company has been and where it is going. Packed with new and updated information, Reading Financial Reports For Dummies gives you a quick but clear introduction to financial reports — and how to decipher the information in them.

• Get down to the nitty gritty — find the lowdown about the types of business structures, the differences between public and private corporations, and the accounting basics necessary to understand financial reports
• The anatomy of annual reports — discover the key elements of an annual financial report, what you can expect to find in the notes to the financial statements, and much more
• It's all in the numbers — get the tools you need to analyze the numbers in financial statements and find out how to test profitability, liquidity, and cash flow
• Optimize operations — find out how to use financial statements to measure how efficiently companies manage their assets and keep cash flowing

Open the book and find:

• Financial reporting basics
• Why financial reporting counts (and who's counting)
• Business types and their tax rules
• How company structure affects the books
• The scoop on income statements and cash flow
• A look at liquidity
• How reports help with basic budgeting
• Signs that a company's in trouble
• Ten financial scandals that rocked the world