Book Description
Finally, a resourceful and unique primer on financial statements that uses a creative and different approach to explain every kind of financial report a small business owner or manager needs to succeed. Through an unique visual approach, this book leads users to a clear understanding of how business scores are kept and how to interpret the results.From balance sheets, cash flow statements and income statements, learn how to understand the basic elements that will pave the way to achieving financial success.
Customer Reviews:
Excellent.......2007-09-10
I'm in an MBA program and have had numerous undergraduate accounting classes. This book is fantastic. It is FAR superior to "How To Read A Financial Report" by John Tracy. "Financial Statements: A Step-By-Step Guide to Understanding and Creating Financial Reports" by Thomas R. Ittelson is clear and concise. It's the best book I've found on the subject. I highly recommend it!
A Sound Basic Review of Financials.......2007-09-07
A sound review of what I learned almost 40 years ago and have not used in about 25 years. Brought back what I learned and used years ago.
Clear, simple and extremly useful.......2007-07-19
For the person who buys stocks, this book is an absolute must. Ittelson's writing is clear and gets to the point. By the end, you will have a very good understanding of financial statements. I got interested in this book as an investor and I am very pleased with my time investment in reading this book.
Worst book I have bought yet.......2007-06-11
I bought 3 books, the one I am reviewing, "Reading Financial Reports For Dummies", and "Guide to Understanding Financial Statements". This book gives no information for beginners who are trying to learn how to understand financial statements. I read all 3 books twice, and I didn't get anything...and I mean nothing from this book. The other two were very well written. Reading Financial Reports For Dummies and The Guide to Understanding Financial Statements. I suggest not wasting your money on this book. It is basically a lot of numbers with very little explanation. It is also confusing because the definitions are different and there is no explanation why they defintions change when reading a financial report.
Good for beginners.......2007-06-07
This book would be an excellent supplement to a beginning accounting class. The author explains the material so that it is very easy to understand.
But if you've taken intermediate or advanced accounting classes, don't waste your money. There isn't anything new in this small book. It doesn't cover all areas of accounting and the areas that are covered are not in-depth. Example: There is a brief mention of straight-line deprection but nothing about salvage value and no mention about the other depreciation methods.
Amazon.com
This handy fact-filled book initiates you into the mysteries of the financial pages -- buying stocks, bonds, mutual funds, futures and options, spotting trends and evaluating companies. For those who are curious but intimidated by everyday financial jargon, this guide offers a literate, forthright and lively alternative. Recommended.
Book Description
The Wall Street Journal Guide to Understanding Money & Investing initiates you into the mysteries of the financial pages -- buying stocks, bonds, mutual funds, futures and options, spotting trends and evaluating companies. For those who are curious but intimidated by everyday financial jargon, this guide offers a literate, forthright and lively alternative.
Customer Reviews:
Great!.......2007-03-27
Just finished reading it. Wow, what a mind trip. Fast shipment too!
Investing for Dummies.......2005-05-03
I cant believe that I went through college without taking business or econ classes (except for political economy). This is a way for me to catch up.
I like this book because it is easy to read and understand. So easy even an elementary school kid could understand....ok maybe junior high.
Eventually I would hope to read the Intelligent Investor.
Excellent basics.......2004-12-08
This book is excellent for learning the basic concepts in investing and finance. If you would like to iniciate in this area, i recommend this book as an entry door with the basics.
The Best.......2004-05-25
As many have said in their reviews, this is a great starting point for those new to investing and financial markets. In fact, it's the best I've ever found and I've looked a lot. The simple, plain English explanations are what makes this book stand out. For the nuances and more detailed information regarding the topics in the book, look to a textbook from a college finance class. But for the person who knows very little, start with this.
Good for beginner investors.......2004-05-23
If you are new to investing and need a simple primer, read this book. It's well organized and written. Those that have invested for a while will find this book simplistic. Nevertheless, I think every beginning investor should get a copy and read it.
Book Description
Understanding Partnership Accounting (Second Edition) is an investment partnership accounting guide written by Advent Software and the Financial Services Industry Group of American Express Tax and Business Services. The book covers the accounting and legal services that investment partnerships require. It also describes how investment partnerships allocate the results of their investments to the partners, including tax reallocations for performance fees, and other tax and reporting issues.
Customer Reviews:
A good book for one to understand partnership accounting.......2007-05-13
The book is well organized. Practical. A nice starter's book for accountant who wants to get in the door of private equity fund's accounting world.
it's OK as an introductory book.......2006-12-31
The book provides an introductory overview of partnership accounting. All the calculations and formulas cited in the book are from its own software. Those similar formulas are also provided in other softwares which are much more commonly used, e.g. MS Excel. Lots of time spent on the tax allocations rather than on the P&L allocations. There're also apparent errors in the formulas as well, such as the annualized return calculation on P. 246.
Book Description
A supplementary text for a variety of Business courses, including Financial Statement Analysis, Principles of Financial Accounting, Intermediate Accounting, Investments, Personal Finance, and Financial Planning and Analysis.
Understanding Financial Statements, retains its reputation for readability, concise coverage, and accessibility while incorporating the many new requirements and changes in accounting reporting and standards. The text gives students the conceptual background and analytical tools necessary to understand and interpret business financial statements. Its ultimate goal is to improve students' ability to translate financial statement numbers into a meaningful map for business decisions and thus enable each student to approach financial statements with enhanced confidence.
Customer Reviews:
Understanding financial statements.......2007-09-26
Great book for learning accounting for the novice. Easy to understand and the problems and discussion help the learning process.
Just as advertised.......2007-09-23
I bought this book for school. It is an easy to read, comprehensive guide to understanding what goes into financial statements.
exact product at an affordable price w a smooth transaction.......2007-05-14
exact product at an affordable price w a smooth transaction
You'll keep this close to your side for years to come..........2006-02-09
I purchased the fifth edition of this book back in 1997 and still have it. I work through it, from start to finish, every three months in order to keep myself fresh and thoroughly knowledgeable about income statements, balance sheets, and cash flows. The exercises are challenging enough to require you to do a little extra research and thinking on your own, i.e., not everything in the questions can be answered by consulting the book. IMPORTANT NOTE TO PROSPECTIVE PURCHASERS OF THIS BOOK: You will have difficulty thoroughly understanding this material unless you have at least a year of financial accounting coursework under your belt. Although I already had 8 accounting courses under my belt by the time I purchased this book, it helped me understand financials like I had never understood them before. A very useful text for those interested in the analysis of, particularly, the income statement and the balance sheet.
Most confusing, wordy textbook I have ever used.......2005-10-02
I am in a graduate program and this is the first time in 16 years of education that I have ever come across such a poorly written textbook! As a previous rater stated, "The presentation of the content assumes that the reader has some knowledge of this content area and at times leaves him/her confused as to what was discussed, making it difficult to understand. Examples that are used are often incomplete and do not provide a complete picture of how statements are generated." I second his sentiment, "Too bad I could not give it zero stars." I would love to contact these individuals and their publisher and recommend they never write again. I need a book I can use again and again when my class is finished, not one I would sooner burn.
Book Description
Turn financial statements into powerful allies in your decision making
Whether you're an investor, creditor, consultant, regulator, manager-or an employee concerned about your company's well-being and the stability of your job-the ability to successfully interpret and analyze financial statements gives you a leg up in today's rough-and-tumble marketplace. Analysis of Financial Statements, Fifth Edition, by Leopold A. Bernstein and John J. Wild, gives you every practical, up-to-date method for making the data in financial statements clear and meaningful. You get analytical tools that range from computation of ratio and cash flow measures to earnings prediction and valuation as you learn how to reconstruct the economic reality embedded in financial statements. User-friendly and engaging, this hands-on classic is loaded with graphs, charts, and tables, so you can see how topics relate to the business practices of actual companies. A concluding comprehensive case analysis of the Campbell Soup Company gives shape and color to the author's step-by-step lessons.
Customer Reviews:
One of the best I've read.......2006-03-17
I am not a CPA or Finance major. I am a physicist so the math is not intimidating. I have been investing as an amateur since retirement and this book gives solid and easily understood ways to get at the valuation of a company and its stock by investigating the financial statements. There is a good comprehensive case study at the end of the book, but I wish the authors would give more examples either within or at the end of each chapter.
Informative, but hard to read.......2003-07-08
I did not finish this book because it is written in a very academic and hard to grasp language. Authors, please make your sentences a little shorter and simpler, the book is very boring and verbose! However, I must give credit to the authors for including almost all of the tools one will need for analysis of financial statements.
Each edition of this book just gets better and better!.......2000-06-03
I have bought every edition of this book, and it just keeps getting better and better. As a 25 year veteran of corporate finance, I continue to use this book myself on a regular basis and to recommend it to less experienced employees who are still developing their expertise. Every finance library should have this book.
Book Description
In this project the student obtains and analyzes an annual report from a publicly traded corporation. Activities include: identifying corporate operations, gaining familiarity with the financial data presentation, recognizing trends, calculating ratios, and performing industry and primary competitor comparisons. This project takes approximately 8 to 20 hours to complete (average 10 hours).
Average customer rating:
- Failed Potential
- Very helpful for beginners
- Until something better comes along. . .
- very disappointing
- A practical book on VaR
|
Mastering Value at Risk: A Step-by-Step Guide to Understanding and Applying VAR (Market Editions)
Cormac Butler
Manufacturer: Financial Times/Prentice Hall
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Similar Items:
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The Fundamentals of Risk Measurement
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Value-at-Risk: Theory and Practice
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Value at Risk, 3rd Ed.
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Value at Risk: The New Benchmark for Managing Financial Risk
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Measuring Market Risk + CD-ROM , 2nd Edition
ASIN: 0273637525 |
Book Description
Value at Risk (VAR) is rapidly emerging as the dominant methodology for estimating precisely how much money is at risk each day in the financial markets. Traders and managers use it to monitor the financial risk of a portfolio. This book provides an objective view of VAR, analyzing its pitfalls as well as its benefits.
Customer Reviews:
Failed Potential.......2007-03-12
This book would have been 5 stars if it had been edited and proofed properly. There are *FAR* too many errors. I would still recommend that one purchase and read this book, which is a good introduction to VaR for the uninitiated, but the error count is just ridiculous. There are significant errors nearly every other page.
There are:
* currency sign errors, which render examples meaningless;
* repeated formula errors, which require the reader to guess the correct formula;
* text errors, which change the meaning of the sentences to their exact opposite;
* errors in punctuation;
* errors in grammar;
* numerical errors in the text next to examples that show the correct numbers.
If there were going to have been a second edition, it would already be out by now, so I'm not hopeful that a new edition will appear to correct the many errors.
I am QUITE surprised that the author doesn't have an errata page at the website he put up for questions on this book at [...]
File this book under "Failed Potential".
Very helpful for beginners.......2006-03-20
I'm chemical Engineer and I'm working on my thesis on to get the Master in Sc. I had no clue in VaR, this book help not only to understand it but to apply it further pure finances.
Until something better comes along. . ........2005-07-19
The other reviewers are correct about the errors. The results of Mr. Butler's formulas sometimes don't match the formulas themselves which in turn don't match his results in the spreadsheets. Also, the grammar, particularly the punctuation, leaves much to be desired. This book had either a poor editor or no editor.
However, Mr. Butler is the only author to write a book that shows actual real-world VaR calculations. The other books give plenty of theory, but never enough detail to enable you to do your own VaR calculations. So until something similar and better comes along, this book will have to do. And really, the errors in the spreadsheets are not that hard to spot if you just follow the text and if you are aware that the errors are there.
very disappointing.......2004-06-25
There are a number of errors in the book, thus making it very hard to get through. Additionally, I spoke to the publisher and there is NOT a second edition of this book available yet - so don't bother with the book. I was also surprised there is nowhere to get copies of the spreadsheets from on the web!!
A note to Mr. Butler - please take a note from Scott Meyers or Bruce Eckel who publish errata web pages.
A practical book on VaR.......2002-09-29
Mastering Value at Risk is 80% practical and 20% theoretical. However, there are a lot of mistakes, specially printing and calculation mistakes. For example, page 24, 25, etc. ambiguous exercises. I require professional solved cases and applications of the real world. Back testing and stress testing themes present a poor development.
There is a great practical case on EWMA, but it can not be compared to GARCH model, because there is not a practical case on GARCH. There is no useful application. This model is only mentioned and explained theoretically. On the other hand Montecarlo Simulation presents a certain confusion. It's unclear and imprecise.
Finally, at the end of the book an address and e-mail are written in order to make contact with the author, but such an e-mail doesn't exist. It was impossible for me to contact Cormac Butler by means of that e-mail. Besides, there is a website in order to send your questions and queries named answerback.org. It was not possible for me to access this website.
Well, the book is good for a reader used to calculate VaR, not for beginners, because of printing errors and calculation mistakes. You must to identify them before to continue the next lesson and theme. Well, my rating to this book is 3 stars.
Book Description
Interest rate swaps--used globally by both corporate finance departments and investment firms to control interest payments, manage debt, and enhance investment portfolios--constitute a growing 1.9 trillion market. Now, financial personnel, swap traders, corporate treasurers, and professional cash managers can turn to this clear, authoritative guide to master all the methodologies used in the international swap market. Written for anyone whose work is touched by swap market activity, the guide uses diagramming techniques to first explain what swaps are, and how and why they are traded. It then addresses more sophisticated financial transactions, such as rate setting, analysis of swap desks, market-to-market, speculating, and financial statements. Readers will find detailed coverage of more than two dozen derivative products, including spreadlocks, swaptions, caps, and flows, and learn how swap trading works in foreign currencies and interest rates. Critical light is also shed on questions regulators are currently raising about the security and future of the swaps markets.
Customer Reviews:
Me thinks some reviewers protest too much.......2004-07-11
This book has been damned for being too simplistic, therefore consign it to the trash cart, or so we are expected to do. But given the relative novelty of these financial products simplicity in the best sense of word could be seen as a virtue in any work dealing with this topic. So, why the evident annoyance from some. Could it be that this work dissolves some of the mystery involved, and threatens some closed shop in these markets ?
Outdated and Shallow.......1999-09-02
The book easily shows its age in its focus on standards and issues which have long ago fallen by the wayside in this dynamic market. Far worse is that the book is preciously short on quantitative and analytic methods, and long on third-grade-teacher types of admonishments. I read the whole book becasue I paid for it, there are better, more up-to-date volumes out there. Could possibly be re-named "Swaps for English Majors", although, English majors as a group might correctly be upset at this association.
Book Description
There's no mystery to understanding company financial statements Even if you have no financial or accounting background, you can read those intimidating-looking financial statements as easily as A-B-C. The second edition of The Guide to Understanding Financial Statements, by S.B. Costales and Geza Szurovy, makes all the numbers and jargon absolutely clear. In seconds you'll spot a company's strengths and weaknesses, see how its performance measures up, and have a solid basis for judging future prospects. The material is so easy to grasp, you'll know it all on first reading, Discover: what a balance sheet really reveals; the true significance of a profit and loss statement; what the six most important financial ratios are, and what each can tell you; how to tell when the numbers are favorable or not; how to spot fraud; how to discover whether the stated value of certain asests is true; much more.
Customer Reviews:
Great Buy!!! Easy to Read and Understand.......2002-06-27
This book was a big help to me. Having only a basic education in accounting, this book laid it out for me in a simple, easy-to-read manner. Definately a good buy!
A Hands Down Great Book For Beginning Managers.......2000-11-16
This book is amazing in that it gives a comprehensive,consise, and simple explanation for finicial statements. I have read many such books, yet this tops them all for its relative simplicity while still being able to get across its point. I would recommend this book to any beginning accountant, manager, or investor. This book shed light on information overlooked by unexperienced businessmen and is a great buy.
Book Description
How to Use Financial Statements explains in clear, easy to understand methods how to read a financial statement. Written for the non-financial professional, this book is ideal for:
- Professionals that have been promoted to a job that requires reviewing financial statements
- Investors that have accumulated enough savings to begin looking at alternatives
- Spouses that have suffered the loss of the member of the family who has always dealt with financial matters
- Readers who work in non-financial areas and have no interest in investments
This practical guide includes:
- An overview of financial statementswhat they are and what they tell us
- A thorough, yet basic introduction to the accrual concepts
- Easy to understand explanations of profit and loss
- Statement of cash flows and special reporting issues
Customer Reviews:
Awesome book.......2007-01-29
I am very happy with financial statements. It is clear, concise and gets right to the point. Plus it's light too. Overall I am happy with my purchase.
good and bad.......2006-10-10
There is no doubt that the author is extremely knowledgeable about financial statements, but he struggles to write a clear introduction for newcomers. I finished the book with a muddy, incomplete understanding of financial statements.
In his attempt to introduce financial statements to first-timers like me, the author gets a couple things right:
- it's short. the length is a very comforting 130 pages.
- it's illustrated. there are drawings of scales with profit/loss, etc. This is essential for visual learners like me.
However, the author fails on these points:
- cute phrases instead of genuine insight. The author's little jokes in the text felt a little self-indulgent, and didn't help explain. There is one exception: it was useful when the author describes the fans of the various reports - P/L vs Balance vs Cash Flow. However, most of the rest of the joking was irrelevant and amateur.
- Not well written. Like many technical books, the quality of writing was poor. Many parts like first drafts - left me with lots of questions. The illustrations often felt incomplete and didn't help explain much.
- Expert blindness. In some ways, experts are the worst people to write books for beginners. They are passionate about the details and history, which is not what newcomers need.
I understand why financial experts would recommend this book to newcomers: they share the passions of the author. However, this doesn't help newcomers. I will keep shopping for the book that gives me the basic 'big picture' understanding of financial statements I need.
excellent refresher.......2006-02-17
I had a basic understanding of financial statements from accounting courses in college, but had forgotten most of it in the past 7 years. This book was a great refresher and would probably also be a good first book for someone with zero - very limited knowledge.
Great for understanding & interpreting financial statements.......2000-03-26
This book teaches anyone (from owners, to managers, to employees, to customers, to lenders, to suppliers, and to attorneys) how to obtain answers from financial statements by asking the right questions. This book is not filled with esoteric symbols and mathematical babbles, but with clear diagrams and down to earth explanations of the applications of each part of the financial statements. The author has done an excellent job on making this seemingly confusing subject very easy to understand and useful to those who needs to make decisions from it.
Good Things Come In Small Packages.......1999-12-24
The best book of its type: covers key points in a direct and effective way. If you need to refresh understanding of financial statements, or learn the basic in a concise format you will be pleased with this book. As a finance professor and practioner (CFA) I have recommended Bandler to numerous students and associates.
Books:
- Foundations of Financial Management (The Mcgraw-Hill/Irwin Series in Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate)
- Foundations of Financial Markets and Institutions (3rd Edition)
- Global Strategy (with World Map and InfoTrac )
- Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't
- Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't
- Healthcare Finance: An Introduction To Accounting And Financial Management
- Healthcare Finance: An Introduction To Accounting And Financial Management
- Healthcare Finance: An Introduction To Accounting And Financial Management
- Healthcare Finance: An Introduction To Accounting And Financial Management
- History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
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