Monday, 2 April 2012

Accounting Questions and Answers

1.Why do capital expenditures increase assets (PP&E), while other cash outflows, like paying salary, taxes, etc., do not create any asset, and instead instantly create an expense on the income statement that reduces equity via retained earnings?
Answer:- Capital expenditures are capitalized because of the timing of their estimated benefits – the lemonade stand will benefit the firm for many years. The employees’ work, on the other hand, benefits the period in which the wages are generated only and should be expensed then. This is what differentiates an asset from an expense.

2. Walk me through a cash flow statement.
Answer:- Start with net income, go line by line through major adjustments (depreciation, changes in working capital and deferred taxes) to arrive at cash flows from operating activities.
  • Mention capital expenditures, asset sales, purchase of intangible assets, and purchase/sale of investment securities to arrive at cash flow from investing activities.
  • Mention repurchase/issuance of debt and equity and paying out dividends to arrive at cash flow from financing activities.
  • Adding cash flows from operations, cash flows from investments, and cash flows from financing gets you to total change of cash.
  • Beginning-of-period cash balance plus change in cash allows you to arrive at end-of-period cash balance             
3.What is working capital?
Answer:-Working capital is defined as current assets minus current liabilities; it tells the financial statement user how much cash is tied up in the business through items such as receivables and inventories and also how much cash is going to be needed to pay off short term obligations in the next 12 months.






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