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2. Application of accountancy/business models
what the marker means is you need to use references from other sources than the annual report.some examples are newspaper reports,trade articles or other reports published by parties NOT related to the company you are analyzing.
as for the rest of your RAP, you need to refer and very clearly understand how to cite references according to the Harvard system.
on a side note,which is my personal opinion, SMRT and SBS are considered monopolies in singapore,each under the control of temasek holdings (a government owned investment company). As such,you might have some difficulties analyzing these companies as SWOT and PESTLE models have limited application.
SBS has historically been a bus operating entity while smrt is in the railway business.the comparison of these 2 public transport providers are vastly different in their own right.i am very surprised that your mentor did not highlight that fact to you.and also, you should keep in mind in order to provide perspective, most analysis involves 2 years worth of financial data (3 would be better) to provide a trend as to how a company have performed over the years.to only have 1 year comparison cannot provide any context,your mentor should also point that out to you!
3. Evaluation of information, analysis and conclusions Fail
Reasons for fail and advice for improvement:
You have made a good start to your project. You have performed some interesting research on the company and industry. However, your financial analysis, particularly looking at your profitability ratios, feels rushed. There is some good research here, but a lack of explanation to how this research fits with the movements in ratios and balances. For example, looking on page 21, you analyse gross profit margin. You state reasons as to why there has been a fall between 2013 and 2014. What about the increase between 2012 to 2013? Then, looking at net profit margin on the next page, your analysis is extremely brief. I can see that the major reason for the changes in net profit margin are the impairment charges. Firstly, these appear significant and need more explanation. Secondly, what about other reasons? What happens to the results if the impairment is removed? There are good elements of your business models, but I would suggest cutting down on the number of models you have used, and expanding on what you have done using one or two models. Your report would be significantly improved with the inclusion of a discussion of limitations of financial and business models. You introduce a swot analysis for BHP yet have not used one for RT, nor have you explained how it concept behind it.4. Presentation of project findings Fail
Reasons for fail and advice for improvement:
Please avoid putting “extracts” from financial statements, and ratio calculations in your report. They are already in the appendix. You only need to show the ratios (preferably in graphical form) in the report. Your analysis from p22 to p27 is very difficult to follow as it is in essence a string of data changes. This you should be illustrating in a graph and leaving the text to properly explain what has occurred.6. Information gathering and Referencing Fail
Reasons for fail and advice for improvement:
Please ensure the annual report is included in your list of references, plus cited within your report as appropriate (rather than referencing to appendix). All sources of information, both financial and non financial, should be referenced.Research Report Assessment F
Reasons for fail and advice for improvement:
Please do not feel too disheartened. You have made a good start on your project and you do not need to make significant changes in order to achieve a pass mark. Please update for latest financial statements if these are available on resubmission.Questions:
I think i know what to do for item 3 & 4 as its clear cut enough.but any inputs will be greatly appreciated.Item 6 is where i need someone to give me an insight on this comment.I was advised that the pdf of the FS/AR is not needed (i got bad advice i think) but I did extract out information from the AR.Could the marker be referring to including the AR and also to cite within the report,i.e copy and paste a paragraph?? or did he mean something else?
Overall it seems that my RAP lacks depth,details and relevancy in some ares.Shouldn’t be too hard to make the amendments, but i prefer to be sure.
Many thanks for your contributions!