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Hello, know that I am too late to worry about my submission for period 33 on T8.
I had used PEST model to analyze at country level on political stability, country’s GDP on disposable income on the middle class, and statistic on tourism which might seem to have relevant impact on the mainstream Airline representing the country, but I did not frequently explain how these macro factors would benefit/drawback to the Airline, will this pose a problem for me passing this project?
I was told by my mentor to use different colors on each different bar charts to demonstrate my IT skills, but with clarity on the chart details, would I still be penalized for being too colorful?
I was told by my mentor not to analyze too much on the comparator because the entire Part 3 should be talking about the main company I have selected, hence I have analyzed the service rankings between the two airlines based on Skytrax Awards, 4 Ratios on ROE, Gearing, Quick/Liquidity/ PE. WTI Oil price movement relating to the boost on Operating profit. And sometimes I used the 3rd and 4th comparator on a short sentence to justified a good/bad example.
Sorry I may be seem worrying this late, but have spent so much effort in the referencing from public Library/search engine and even paid $40 Turnit-In to ensure my gauge is below 5% probability towards plagiarism, getting into trouble re-amending the report again and again to almost Max word counts for all sections. Just do not want to fail. 🙂
I choose a company with year end 31 dec 2016 and their financial statement will be published in April 2017. I know that rules allow me to use 2013, 2014 and 2015 financial statements, however when i am doing business analysis i have to cover latest happenings but when it comes to financial analysis i have to go back in year 2015 (as 2016 f/s are not available) so that i can relate changes to financial performance with happenings in 2015.
I am little confused about whether i understand this right? will financial analysis looks out of context, and how i will be able to relate changes in financial performance with business analysis since the years are different?
Thank you very much for your support.
zhixiang85 -As you have observed nothing can change things now! I cannot say whether any student will have passed or not all I can say is that if they have followed my advice they will have increased their chances of passing.
I have suggested many times that the models/business analysis for T8 should be applied and done BEFORE the financial analysis as they set the scene. The management strategic decisions depend on the SWOT/ PESTLE/Porter’s and those in turn impact on the financial performance. It is reasoned analysis that gets a pass and showing how the company has arrived at its current position. Statements of the obvious (just commenting on increases /decreases) and just repeating figures from the graph is not going to get a pass.
There is no problem with colour provided you are consistent. If you choose for example green for the main company and blue for the comparator stick to those throughout. This is because the narker needs to be able to grasp the situation quickly and if they have to stop each time to work out which company is which this will interrupt the flow of assimilating your work. It is far better to produce clear well labelled graphs than aim to paint a rainbow to help them with this.
As long as you didn’t go down the route of just saying one outperformed the other (a statement of the obvious that the graph will have already shown) and by how much (again if the graph is clear the marker can see this already) without suggesting why then you should be ok.
Universities do not just rely on Turnitin – they are aware that students will use a number of techniques to try to bring down the score (word substitution a bit of rephrasing for example). OBU also looks at the content of presentations and spreadaheets as they know some mentors supply templates (be wary if a mentor offers these – they will call them ‘samples’). Several mentors have been banned for this and OBU says it is determined to stamp this practice out and will certainly not hesitate to remove more from the list.
I suggest you now chill as it is too late to change things now.
@saan With an airline the main issue in the environment that is volatile are exchange rates and fuel prices. Airlines get round this by hedging and forward buying on the futures market. There is always a time lag between business environmental factors influencing management strategic decisions and the impact of these decisions on financial performance and this is particularly so with airlines (where it can be several years e.g. decisions to acquire aircraft, open new routes). I think when you get down to it the problem you have outlined will mainly disappear.
@trephena Thanks for all the pointers, they are all really helpful tips for everyone doing T8. Glad that I had placed the PEST-analysis before drilling down to the financial ratios of the company/comparator. There were about 40 additional references (No Wikipedia/investopedia) made throughout to support the reason for company segments up/down %. All charts/graphs in my excel were made from scratch. I had worried unnecessary because in an event of resubmission due to a strict marker would clash my revision for June 2017 exam, but I should chill and certainly make contingency plan. Glad to came across Open Tuition, it’s certainly helpful.
You have mentioned a very good point regarding environment, management decision and impact on performance. Thank you.
Cheers.
Should I only include latest “annual” financial statements in financial analysis or latest interim f/s as well?
Thanks.
Just the latest Financial Statements unless there is something particularly pertinent in the interim ones or announcements that support strategies. Then they can be really useful to strengthen the evaluation if used in this way.
Very well. Thank you very much.
Dear OBU mentors,
May I ask one question, for the submission period 34, May 2017.
Can I use the 3 period financial statements from the year 2013, 2014, 2015 ?Because for 2016, the FS of airline industry that I choose have not been issued yet.
The rules are set out in the Information Pack. The 90 day rule means that you have to use the latest statements that were available at 1 February 2017
Ok thank you trephena..
May I ask one question again ?
For the financial statements, may I download it from Bloomberg database ? rather than from the company’s own website.Yes of course -the figures should be the same although the annual report usually contains the CEO or Chairman’s statement and the directors’ report and these are important for ascertaining the company’s strategies.
And also, if the currency of the company that I used is in IDR, and the comparator company’s currency is in MYR, is this still acceptable ?
Is it possible for to use competitor company with year end dec 2015 for main company with year end march 2016? it comes to 91 days
Hi everyone,
I am preparing part 2 of my Rap (Topic 8), KPI section. I have following problem. I want to list and describe KPI which I will use for Ryanair and Easy Jet but the problem is that both companies use slightly different measures. For instance, Easy Jet use ‘cost per seat’ and ryanair ‘cost per booked passanger’. So I don’t have common KPIs for both companies in order to do proper comparison/analysis. Could you recommend me source where I find such. Above mentioned are taken from Fnancials. Maybe there is somewhere website where I can find same KPI for both companies..
@trephena Thank you for your input on this forum, your help is extremly useful. I try to read all your post in this thread, and helps me a lot. You are star!
bik123 – interesting that the terminology varies as CASK is not quite the same as costs per booked seat.
I can’t categorically give you a website that will sort the above problem out but for many comparisons you could try:
https://www.theairlineanalyst.com/Login.aspx?ReturnURL=/ComparisonManagement.aspx
I haven’t had the need to use this myself so the inclusion of this link does not guarantee that the results for comparisons are 100% accurate. As the load factor and seat information is internal info there is usually no compulsion on an airline to publish it but most do in their CEO or directors’ reports. However you may find other useful comparisons via this airline analyst link. However please remember to reference it if you use it in your report.
i chose emirates airlines andthey have some interim facts and figures. is it possible to use these for the report. There are also newspaper articles which talk about these figures.
@thank you trephena and @amal3008, I have requested demo account for theairlineanalyst , it can be interesting source.
@amal3008 -there is normally no problem in principle using financial statements that are only 3 months apart and they both include December (as in Dec 2016 and Mar 2017) . The issue would be that for P34 March 2017 statements would not be available so you would have to use interim accounts that went up to the 3rd quarter, Dec 2016 and either apportion using the Q4 from 2016 to make 12 months or use regression analysis to produce your trend lines. (And explain your approach)
Good if there are newspaper articles as the markers like to see that you are not just using financial statements
As these 2 airlines have different business models they are not a good match. As Easyjet is a low cost airline with just budget price seats choose a company with a similar outlook like Ryanair.
BA operates at least 2 classes on flights -economy and business class and on some long haul routes has the high end First Class cBain so Virgin Atlantic is a better comparator as it too has 3 tiers of service
Is British Telecom Group and competitor Sky PLC suitable companies to choose for RAP Topic 8?
This thread is exclusively about using an airline for Topic 8!
The correct place for questions and answers for the other industry sectors is https://opentuition.com/topic/mentor-advice-needed-for-obu-rap-topic-selection/
My comment about BT is that BT tends to own the infrastructure in the UK and gains considerable income from this (line rentals and charging other companies like Virgin Media and probably Sky too for using their cables and fibre network).
SKY commissions its own programmes and film series whereas I don’t think BT does. So my reaction might be to pair Virgin Media with Sky as their business models are possibly more similar.
However if you have access to sufficient information you could present BT and Sky on their phone, internet and sports offerings and compare performance on that basis. Please address any other questions in relation to this on the thread I have provided so it is in the right place.
Hello all. I am preparing my submission for May and my topic is number 8; analysis of British Airways for years 2014-2016. I have about seven different ratios for the financial analysis. However as I was trying to calculate the gp and np margins, I noticed that there is only a consolidated income statement for the group not just british airways. There is however a separate balance sheet.
Should I calculate based on the group? If not where can I get the single income statement for BA?
Thank you everyone for your help.
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