Accounting Ratios                                                              5
F   inancial statements aim at providing financial
                                     information about a business enterprise to meet
                                 the information needs of the decision-makers.
                                 Financial statements prepared by a business
                                 enterprise in the corporate sector are published and
                                 are available to the decision-makers. These
                                 statements provide financial data which require
                                 analysis, comparison and interpretation for taking
                                 decision by the external as well as internal users of
                                 accounting information. This act is termed as
                                 financial statement analysis. It is regarded as an
                                 integral and important part of accounting. As
                                 indicated in the previous chapter, the most
                                 commonly used techniques of financial statements
                                 analysis are comparative statements, common size
    LEARNING OBJECTIVES
                                 statements, trend analysis, accounting ratios and
After studying this chapter,
you will be able to :            cash flow analysis. The first three have been
• explain the meaning,           discussed in detail in the previous chapter. This
   objectives and limitations    chapter covers the technique of accounting ratios
   of accounting ratios;         for analysing the information contained in financial
•   identify the various         statements for assessing the solvency, efficiency and
    types of ratios commonly     profitability of the enterprises.
    used ;
•   calculate various ratios     5.1   Meaning of Accounting Ratios
    to assess solvency,
    liquidity, efficiency and    As stated earlier, accounting ratios are an important
    profitability of the firm;   tool of financial statements analysis. A ratio is a
•   interpret the various        mathematical number calculated as a reference to
    ratios calculated for        relationship of two or more numbers and can be
    intra-firm and inter-        expressed as a fraction, proportion, percentage and
    firm comparisons.            a number of times. When the number is calculated
                                 by referring to two accounting numbers derived from