标题: Why do people call FSA accounting? [打印本页] 作者: draz 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
Because most of FSA is just making a number fit a rule, which is what accounting is.
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"good personality ... or he was known as Lt. Mandingo during his army days."作者: kamara5 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
Dont know about everyone else, but I do relate it to accounting most of the time, maybe because when I did A/O-Level, this is what we called accounting, including the ratio analysis.
With respect to the CFA material, most of the FSA stuff is related to accounting treatment of leases or assets/liabilities or taxes or whatever. Of course, you are looking at it from the perspective of an analyst, and the material is not really accounting per se作者: karoliukas 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22 标题: Why do people call FSA accounting?
I think the reason why people feel intimidated by it is because they somehow think FSA means accounting when in fact most accountants hardly know what ROE is.
FSA is a crucial part of analysing a company and its quite easy to master as long as you know what the 3 main types of financial statements are and how they are related to each other.
Once you understand the financials, the ratios, IFRS/GAAP crap, etc will all make sense
just my two cents.... now carry on whatever it was that you were doing作者: bluejazzy 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
bchadwick Wrote:
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> I'd say it's because the financial statements
> start with the stuff that is produced by
> accountants (Balance Sheet, Income Statement, Cash
> Flow Statement). I was surprised to learn that
> most of the ratios and a lot of the other analysis
> that goes into FSA is new to many accountants.
exactly
an accountant could careless about the ratios. He is forever stuck in the world of debits and credits. Its the finance guys that even both calculating these ratios (which are usually used to make investment decisions anyway)作者: kd26gioi 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
Uh, if you go to a university, the Financial Statement Analysis courses are always under accounting courses, never finance.作者: shootingstar 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
sundusg_ Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Dont know about everyone else, but I do relate it
> to accounting most of the time, maybe because when
> I did A/O-Level, this is what we called
> accounting, including the ratio analysis.
>
> With respect to the CFA material, most of the FSA
> stuff is related to accounting treatment of leases
> or assets/liabilities or taxes or whatever. Of
> course, you are looking at it from the perspective
> of an analyst, and the material is not really
> accounting per se
I think the accounting treatment for operating/capital leases is important to understand the true liabilities of a company and thats more important to a financial analyst not an accountant
We need to know the difference because it affects the way one values a company. Accounting would be more like if I enter into a operating leases what do I debit and what do I credit. The CFA doesn't worry about that.作者: eagles_dare13 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
sundusg_ Wrote:
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> the accountant needs to worry about that too.
> thats where accounting fraud comes from. the
> accountant is THE guy who knows how to manipulate
> financial statements, and he should, by
> definition, know the effects of this over that. i
> mean, not for the specific reason to commit fraud,
> but if you are preparing the financial statements,
> you dont just do the debits and credits without
> thinking or knowing about what chain effects the
> debits/credits will have.
Accounting fraud is usally caused by management not the accountants. Like I said they only care about the debits/credits.作者: Mechanic 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
the accountant needs to worry about that too. thats where accounting fraud comes from. the accountant is THE guy who knows how to manipulate financial statements, and he should, by definition, know the effects of this over that. i mean, not for the specific reason to commit fraud, but if you are preparing the financial statements, you dont just do the debits and credits without thinking or knowing about what chain effects the debits/credits will have.作者: btcapital 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
so the management is supposed to be an expert on understating expenses and overstating profits and what not to, say, meet debt covenants? they need the accountants to do it for them作者: Jolyn 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
Here is my 2 cents:
FSA is not accounting period! Accountants prepare financial statements.... FSA is about analyzing financial statements.
Just my POV!作者: koba 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
BTW folks. It used to be FSA. Now its FRA.
It has gone from financial statement analysis to financial reporting and analysis.作者: Maddin 时间: 2011-7-11 15:22
bchadwick Wrote:
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> beatthecfa Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > BTW folks. It used to be FSA. Now its FRA.
> >
> > It has gone from financial statement analysis
> to
> > financial reporting and analysis.
>
>
> Ah, that makes sense. I was thinking "wow, they
> put Forward Rate Agreements all over the
> curriculum again, I'd thought they'd taken that
> stuff out."
LOL
investragy, i agree that accounting and analysis of financial statements are two different things. but you need to be familiar with one to be good at the other, which is why the teachings for both cover alot of similar material. theres a bit of a grey area here.作者: Siddimaula 时间: 2011-7-11 15:23
sundusg_ Wrote:
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> so the management is supposed to be an expert on
> understating expenses and overstating profits and
> what not to, say, meet debt covenants? they need
> the accountants to do it for them
actually yes they are
Enron scandal was a product of Jeff Skilling and Kenneth Lay not the accountants. They just did what these guys told them to do.
You are thinking too highly of accountants. They are like what pharmacists are in the healtcare world, pill counters. They think they are as valuable as a doctor but we all know they are worthless. I guess the only reason their salaries are so high is to prevent them from selling the expensive prescriptions illegally on the street.作者: lc26mizzou 时间: 2011-7-11 15:23
And the Enron fraud was being done mostly by CFO Andy Fastow. The guy was an evil genius, really.作者: Wasteoftime 时间: 2011-7-11 15:23
20% of my Intro to Financial Accounting class was all ratios. We had to know like 30 of them and we were just given a balance sheet, income statement, cash flows, oci and we had to rock em out.
FRA is to accounting what reading is to writing.作者: siavosh 时间: 2011-7-11 15:23
Zero bonus:
Quite a bit of hate for the accountants, huh? Were you shat upon by some CPA recently?
A review or audit requires that the accountant perform analytical procedures as a way of "testing" the quality of the numbers. Those procedures include ratio analysis.
I am not sure where you get your abhorrence toward the accounting profession, but learn a bit about it before you rant.作者: cyber21 时间: 2011-7-11 15:23
Most companies CFOs have CPA not CFA作者: Beatnik 时间: 2011-7-11 15:23
I think it's rude to undermine accountants. Not that I am one, but 'pill counters,'?! Seriously? How would it be possible to conduct ANY financial analysis without having the statements to start off with.
Seriously you gotta ask yourself who is responsible for learning all the various intricate standards & policies and preparing these statements in the first place.. That way you might not be so full of yourself作者: sgupta0827 时间: 2011-7-11 15:23
I would never want to be an accountant myself, but I have no doubt that accountancy requires talent.作者: dece2011 时间: 2011-7-11 15:23
BeboThoughts Wrote:
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> 20% of my Intro to Financial Accounting class was
> all ratios. We had to know like 30 of them and we
> were just given a balance sheet, income statement,
> cash flows, oci and we had to rock em out.
>
> FRA is to accounting what reading is to writing.
Bebo said it all!
Zero, what you said about enron is true, but dont you think the exec management knows a thing or two about accounting which is why they tell the accountants what to do?作者: ftwcfa 时间: 2011-7-11 15:23
Here's my take:
Accounting is more done from the "front end" of the process - how do they record the transactions of the company and prepare statements according to GAAP.
The CFA body of knowledge requires that you be able to ANALYZE these statements to convert them into something that reflected the real, economic priospects of the company in question. So, in some sense you are translating them into "finance-exe".
Lease accounting and pension accounting are good examples - a finance person is concerned with the amount of debt and other fixed obligations carried by a firm. Because of the quirks of the accounting system, the financial statements don't always label what we'd consider debt (e.g. an operating lease) as "debt". So, we translate. But in order to translate, we need to know how the statements are constructed.
The best background is to have both accounting and finance. One constructs the statements, and one uses them.作者: kasinkei 时间: 2011-7-11 15:23
True that FRA is geared more toward analyzing and interpreting financial statements from the CFA perspective. However, as CPA, I can tell you that about 90% of the material in FRA is required knowledge for becoming a CPA.
investragy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Here is my 2 cents:
>
> FSA is not accounting period! Accountants prepare
> financial statements.... FSA is about analyzing
> financial statements.
>
> Just my POV!
