# How to Read a Financial Report: Wringing Vital Signs Out of the Numbers

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/books/how-to-read-a-financial-report/
- Published: 2020-03-19T23:52:00+00:00
- Author: Howard Lake

**Financial statements are full of vital information about a company’s current health
and future prospects. Managers, investors, and others need to understand these reports,
which sometimes seem to be written in a foreign language that only accountants can
speak. **

Now in its ninth edition, _How to Read a Financial Report_ continues its 40-year
tradition of breaking through that language barrier and providing a plain-English
user’s guide to financial reports. This edition reflects recent changes to accounting
rules, maintaining its classic focus on helping readers interpret the interconnections
among disparate pieces of financial data.

Financial reports are used to provide a range of vital information, including an
organisation’s cash flow, financial condition, and profit performance (aka The Big
Three Financial Statements). Financial statements are often complex and extremely
difficult to understand for anyone other than accounting and finance professionals.

_How to Read a Financial Report _enables investors, lenders, business leaders, analysts,
and managers to read, analyze, and interpret financial accounting reports.

Designed specifically for non-specialists, this reader-friendly resource covers 
the fundamentals of financial reporting in jargon-free English. Topics such as sales
revenue & recognition, costs of goods sold, sources & uses of capital/cash, non-
cash expenses (e.g., depreciation expense), income tax obligations, understanding
profits & financial stability, and financial statement ratios & analysis are covered
throughout the book.

Now in its ninth edition, this bestselling guide has been thoroughly revised to 
reflect changes in accounting and financial reporting rules, current practices, 
and recent trends. New and expanded content explains managing cash flow, illustrates
the deceitful misrepresentation of profits in some financial reports (aka Financial
Engineering), and more.

Further, end-of-chapter activities help readers learn the intricacies of the balance
sheet and cash flow statement, while updated sections address shifts in regulatory
standards.

Written by two highly experienced experts in financial accounting, this resource:

 * Enables readers to cut through the noise and focus on what financial reports 
   and financial statements are really saying about a company
 * Clarifies commonly misunderstood aspects of financial reporting and how companies
   can “financially engineer” operating results
 * Offers comprehensive, step-by-step guidance on analysing financial reports