Ok so I am doing my RAP T8 on GlaxoSmithKline, a pharmaceutical company. I have a list of Qs that I need to clarify.
1. Can a single reference be used twice in RAP?
2. If not, how it should be referred to. For e.g: my findings in SWOT relate to financial analysis (ratios), how and where should I link them together, within SWOT or in financial analysis individual ratio?
3. Does the commentary of ratios be equally given importance when using a comparator?
4. I have mentioned in section 2 that I will be conducting Financial analysis with both ratio analysis and horizontal analysis. What is the best approach to do this given the word count limit?
5. I read somewhere that its a good way to include limitations of business models used at end of discussion of business analysis relating to the case (not general cons/drawbacks of the model). Any tips?
6. Some of my ratios are slightly different from those mentioned in annual reports. I have referred to notes, restated financials but nothing seems to narrow down the gaps. Should I continue with it or is it suppose to be accurate as Annual Reports?
(Differences are with: Debtor days, Payable days, Inventory days & turnover, Fixed asset turnover)
7. Also, I have mostly read here that SWOT works best with PESTEL or PEST, my mentor suggest Porter's 5 forces. Although a lot of material I already mentioned in SWOT can be used in PEST. Whereas I am not getting many ideas on Porter's. But at the same point I do not want to be repeating my words I used in SWOT. Any tips?
I will be adding Qs as I progress with my RAP.
Thanking in advance for your comments on this thread.
Other Accountancy Qualifications
General Queries Topic 8
then focus on the country where its headquarter resides...thanks.
Hi,
I just have a couple of questions:
1. If the financials of the company and comparator are presented in different currencies, is there any need for translation? and shall I include this under limitation section?
2. Do I need to reference any information taken from the annual reports while discussing the reasons for changes in ratios/trends? Or the marker is already aware of the source and hence referencing is not necessary?
Thank you
have chosen topic 8 for my thesis and the company which i have chosen is oreedo the telecommunication company please tell
me will this company be suitable for this topic?
@warda - This is something we probably cannot answer on this website. You will need to read the Information Pack to see if your company fits the criteria required in terms of availability of information and having a suitable comparator. Any company that does not fulfil these should not be attempted. Discuss your selection of a company as part of your first meeting with a mentor
Dear All
I hope you can assist me.
I am struggling in finding the ethical issues as per my guide rap that I should encounter during my gathering of information.
FS are open to human interpretation , and error by their nature so I don't think its an ethical issue ? What are the issues that I can indicates? Could you give me some guidance?
Many thanks
Barbara
@barbara2012 As you are doing Topic 8 there are little or no issues regarding Ethics in information gathering. Such issues relate to primary data collection where you are involving others in your research (and then there are then issues of 'informed consent', the storage of personal data, confidentiality and potentially psychological stress, 'intrusive intervention' and coercion - with regard to those interviewed or surveyed). All you need to do is a paragraph relating to the fact that you have completed the ACCA Ethics Module (which you have to have done by March 2015 anyway to be able to submit in May 2015) and that as a professional you are bound by professional ethics. Then you can more or less rephrase what I have written above in relation to no issues arising such as those with primary data as you are relying exclusively on secondary sources..
Your second paragraph relates to Limitations of your data which is an entirely separate issue to ethics. You should be able to objective criticisms about using financial statements, SWOT, PESTLE techniques etc if you research articles on the web.
hi, m working on topic 8 n i've chosen OGDCL the target company, with capital employed in billions, whereas its competitors have way smaller cap.employed , its a diffrnce like 43 billion and 8299 million. cd it work ???????? plzzzzz answer asap
@dominicanian - the idea of using a comparator company is to put the performance of your chosen company and its financial results into a business context, so the two companies should have similarities otherwise the differences in their performances can be mainly due to their size and other reasons are less obvious. Comparing a small company with a large company is therefore not ideal as the analysis could be compromised and consequently weak. I would not advise using companies that are so dissimlar unless there really is no other company that is a similar size. There could also be problems in choosing a scale in producing sensible charts and graphs if the differences are too great (note: I have seen marker comments suggesting both companies should be shown alongside each other when doing comparisons rather than doing a separate graph for each company, so you should endeavour to comply with this requirement).
Any disparities that are likely to influence the data or skew the results must be noted in the Limitations of the data section of your RAP. So if you are forced to have a comparator that is not ideal you need to justify why you are using it and then consider how potentially you analysis could be impaired by this and suggest any steps that can be taken to minimise the effects of the disparities.
Hello people, I have decided to go with topic 8 on the RAP. I've looked through different threads on the forum regarding choosing a company, but can't find anything about how much primary research will be needed. I'm Irish but living in Australia and as much as I would like to do it on either an Irish or UK company, I'm worried that I will need to set up interviews with company officials, which obviously isnt an option from Oz.
Would I be better off doing it on an Australian company? Or will the info I can get from reports, FS and journals be enough without having to talk directly to the company?
Please people, surely someone must know? @trephena
@hanson90 Sure I know but I have a serious work deadline at the moment so my voluntary time for OT is a bit limited right now :-)
Primary data is not normally required at all for T8 -which is fortunate as I doubt company officers would spare you the time of day. You do T8 by using secondary data - annual reports, trade & industry journals and articles from the business press (e.g. BBC news online, Daily Telegraph, Forbes, Huffington Post, Reuters, etc all normally available on line).
As far,as I recall I have only ever recommended doing primary data for T8 to one student and that was because the entity he had chosen had clearly identified 'customers' upon which the organisation heavily depended who were concentrated geographically. It was therefore appropriate to survey them. This was a unique and isolated case and I cannot envisage these factors being applicable to a normal plc.
Please take a look at the article I did on our homepage on Evaluation
see www.opentuition.com/obu
as I try to give a bit of guidance on how to approach T8 there
Legend. Thanks a million!
Dear All
Could you tell me how I should make a structure of SWOT analysis and ratios of my main company A and comparator B either 1 or 2 below?
1. In order, with subheading like ratios of company A then ratios company B, then SWOT of company A then SWOT of company B, not mixed them up.
2. By ratios , eg, sub-heading Gross profit margin (GPM) , then mention that increase or decrease then as a result this is A's strength or B's weakness .....i.e. mixed SWOT and ratios
OR
by SWOT and explain the strength for example with ratios result of whether GPM has increased or decrease as the reason
Thank you for your all help in advance
Dear All and Trephena
I would like to hear your comment on my thought below:
Trephena seems to recommend to use SWOT and PESTEL for topic 8 not 5forces in the forums.
I should have known earlier but I have done 5 forces although it has not fully completed , at least I put all ideas for each categories.
Now I am thinking that I should do PESTEL using the ideas for 5forces OR should I stick to my 5forces?
My worrying is that taking Trephena's advice into consideration , my 5 forces would not be utilised in a effective way such as mixing up with my ratios.
Please give me your thoughts on this, thank you for all.
@pinkmonkey - there is no need to apply the models formally to both companies, you only apply them to the main company. However it is good if you can bring in SWOT and PEST factors where relevant to explain the differences in the companies' performances in your text within the ratio sections. The markers do not just want to be told that Company A's gross profit was x% more than Company B - they want to know what brought this about (and often it comes down to management strategies based on the SWOT/PEST) so you need to explain this to them.
Please, pretty please, can you NOT keep opening new topics but use the search facility? - we probably have one already on models and it would be Soooo much better it you could post to an already existing relevant forum as it keeps our forums tidy :-D.
Thanks
Trephena.
Dear Trephena
Thank you very much for your reply and your thoughts.
Sorry for making a new topic....try to be tidy.
The 'search' function in this website proves to be futile.
No results found no matter what I typed in.
So I have to ask this question unaware of whether it has been answered before.
I googled for annual reports for several american companies, but their latest annual reports are for year 2013. Indeed, very few companies have the 2014 annual reports.
As to the choice of organisations, I have following questions:
1) What size of a company is easy to handle? I don't want a company to be too large.
2) I prefer the co. and its comparator to be within the same country. Is that better than if they are in different countries?
PS. Can I use colors in the headings and graphs of my project paper? I saw in the information pack that it had to be black and white.
@moioi - this particular forum topic 'Queries Topic 8' is usually on Page 1 and is used for general queries
US companies have a year end 31st Dec and the accounts are not normally available before 1 Feb the following year so 2013 will be permissible for P30 (see p.39 of the Information Pack to check) but 2014 would be required for P31
1. It is not so much size but availability of commentary on the companies' performances. Narrow your choice down to a few companies then look on Forbes, Bloomberg etc for articles on these companies to help you choose.
2. It is easier perhaps if they are in the same country but if not, particular features of their main markets and operations need to be considered both in the Limitations section and in the analysis. Different currencies are not normally too much of a problem as ratios should be predominantly used
Puzzled by the black and white thing - use colour wherever you want in graphs and headings and where it is relevant.. However the MAIN text should be Black and the background white with consistent margins, indentations, font and font sizes BUT headings which use a different colour or font/font size can be a good idea to create emphasis
Dear Trephena
I just wonder still that I should create PESTEL from 5 forces as you have not mentioned your thought whether I should do or not.
I would appreciate it if you could give me your thought.
Kind regards
@pinkmonkey - it is up to you which models you choose. Personally for T8 I would do a good SWOT and PESTLE. I might however cconsider Potter's 5 Forces for a RAP on T18 or one involving information systems.
Thanks very much for your generous reply.
And I now know where to find the answers for Topic 8.
i choose a company(parent) which have 2 subsidiaries do i have to show there financial statements and discuss there role in parent company
or
i have to take consolidated FS and not to worry about subsidiaries ???
is this necessary to do cashflow analysis? what I can write in this part? any idea for recommendation of topic 8?
Thanks
@redoy300 - no you do not have to do a cashflow analysis for T8
Hello,
As I am carrying out the analysis for the years 2012-2014, how important is to compare the year 2012 with 2011?
Also would identifying any figures in the notes to accounts that drive the change in the accounts, and explaining why there is a change in them be considered as good analysis? For eg. (a real estate company whose policy is to move properties from developmental properties to inventory upon completion), there has been a huge decrease in the inventory due to transfer of properties from developmental properties in year 2, and subsequent sale in year 3 (for which I have sufficient evidence from the news articles), resulting in lower inventories. Will this be sufficient analysis for the change in current ratio?
If not, what alternative thinking should I follow?
Thanks a lot!
Hi ,
The division of total word count for is Part 1 1000 words Part 2 2000 words and Part 3 4500 words in info pack . Do i have to stick to this division of words ?? Is business analysis is more important or financial analysis in terms of word count in RAP topic 8
Regards
@nazu - this has been answered in our FAQs so please refer to these on our homepage
www.opentuition.com/obu
I was using PESTEL and SWOT to analyse the company.
But my mentor told me to use Porter's Five Forces and SWOT/PESTEL to do the analysis.
I wonder if Porter's Five Forces is suitable for the analysis, as I saw that most students didn't use it.
Thanks.
@moioi - I have answered this previously so please look at my previous answers by clicking on my avatar and then click on my forum replies. If you scroll through you will find my answer
is it okay to copy and past, and proper reference it. or we have to write in our words and proper reference it. e.g. definitions of swot , or ratio's and their limitation in part 2, and in part 3, like in annual report the reason for fall in gross profit is given, so i have to write it in my own words, or just quote it from their and reference it ?
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