Synopses & Reviews
Learn to:
- Make sense of accounting basics
- Read and understand financial statements
- Report income and expenses for public or private companies
Create great financials and boost your bottom line
Want to make sense of accounting basics? This plain-English guide helps you speak your accountant's language with ease, minimizing confusion as you maximize profits. You'll find out how to manage inventory, report income and expenses for public or private companies, evaluate profit margins, analyze business strengths and weaknesses, and manage budgets for a better bottom line.
- Accounting 101 get an easy-to-understand overview of accounting, from business to bookkeeping and accounting systems
- It's all in the finances find out how businesses record certain revenues and expenses, and how those choices affect the values recorded for assets, liabilities, and profit
- Manage wisely discover how professionals choose legal structures, design a profit performance report, and determine product costs
- Report it grasp how a financial report is made ready for release outside the business, how investors and lenders read financial statements, and more
Open the book and find:
- The scoop on financial statements and accounting standards
- Ways to analyze and manage profit
- Why "cost" isn't a singular concept
- How to prepare and use financial reports
- Handy tips for getting the most out of reading a financial report
- Ten accounting tips for managers
- A glossary that slashes through the accounting jargon jungle
Synopsis
Learn the basics of practical accountingFeaturing the latest information on accounting methods and standards, this guide shows you how to avoid accounting fraud, minimize confusion, maximize profits, and make sense of accounting basics. You'll quickly understand how to manage inventory, report income and expenses for public or private companies, evaluate profit margins, analyze business strengths and weaknesses, and manage budgets for a better bottom line.
With 25 percent new content including updated information on small and large business reporting standards, international accounting standards, and preventing financial reporting fraud, Accounting For Dummies continues to be an excellent resource for those studying accounting.
- The separate accounting and financial reporting standards for private/small businesses versus public/large businesses (Little GAAP vs. Big GAAP)
- The internationalization of accounting standards
- The rise in restatements of previously issued financial reports by public corporations, and how revisions of previously reported earnings impact investors
- The increasing focus on preventing financial reporting fraud and the expanded role and responsibility of the CPA auditor
- Accounting problems with stock options
- The "unaccounted for" cost of employee pensions and retirement health care costs, in both the private and public sectors
- Expanded coverage of small business accounting
- Updated resources and websites
The information in Accounting For Dummies is valuable for anyone studying or working in the fields of accounting or finance.
About the Author
John A. Tracy, CPA, is Professor of Accounting, Emeritus, at the University of Colorado in Boulder. A former staff accountant at Ernst & Young, Tracy has authored numerous books on accounting.
Table of Contents
Introduction 1
Part I: Opening the Books on Accounting 11
Chapter 1: Accounting: The Language of Business, Investing, Finance, and Taxes 13
Chapter 2: Financial Statements and Accounting Standards 33
Chapter 3: Keeping the Books 57
Part II: Exploring Financial Statements 81
Chapter 4: Reporting Profit 83
Chapter 5: Reporting Financial Condition 107
Chapter 6: Reporting Cash Flows and Changes in Stockholders’ Equity 131
Chapter 7: Accounting Alternatives 151
Part III: Accounting in Managing a Business 173
Chapter 8: Deciding the Legal Structure for a Business 175
Chapter 9: Accounting in Managing Profit 199
Chapter 10: Budgeting 221
Chapter 11: Cost Accounting 241
Part IV: Preparing and Using Financial Reports 263
Chapter 12: Getting a Financial Report Ready 265
Chapter 13: How Lenders and Investors Read a Financial Report 291
Chapter 14: Filling Out the Financial Statements for Business Managers 319
Part V: The Part of Tens 337
Chapter 15: Ten Accounting Tips for Managers 339
Chapter 16: Ten Tips for Reading a Financial Report 349
Appendix: Glossary: Slashing Through the Accounting Jargon Jungle 359
Index 373