Cash Flow – Cash Flow Notes

The Cash Flow Statement is made up of three sections. The first section is operating activities. Operating activities include your company’s profit or loss and non-cash items that affect your profit without affecting cash. Examples of these types of non-cash expenses are depreciation and bad-debt expense. Also included in this section are changes to your operating assets and liabilities. Operating assets and liabilities include accounts receivable, prepaid expenses, accounts payable and accrued liabilities. A common feature of operating assets and liabilities is these items have been reflected in the Profit & Loss Statement in a period different from the period in which they were paid.

 The second section of the Cash Flow Statement is investing activities. Investing activities are items such as property and equipment or loans receivables. An interesting aspect of investing activities assets is that they, unlike operating assets, generally do not affect the company’s profit. In other words, investing assets do not represent revenue or expense items.

 The third and final section of the Cash Flow Statement is financing activities. Financing activities are debt and equity items. If you increase or decrease your debt, that change is included in financing activities. Equity changes such a capital contributions or shareholder distributions also are reflected under financing activities. Like investing activities assets, financing activities liabilities and equity do not represent revenue or expense items.

 The sum of the three sections: Operating activities, investing activities and financing activities is your cash flow for the period being reported. A positive number indicates an increase in cash and decrease indicates a decrease in cash. Now it’s time to take a closer look at the Cash Flow Statement and see why your cash flow is different from your profit.

 Compare your cash flow to your profit. If your cash flow is higher than your profit, you are either liquidating assets or increasing your debt, which is negative for your business. On the other hand, it could be that you are increasing your capital, which is a positive for your business.

 If your cash flow is less than your profit, you are increasing your assets, such as purchasing property and equipment for future growth or paying down your debt. These are both positives for your business. But it could mean that your money is being tied up in accounts receivable because collections have deteriorated and your business is weakening. Or it could be that you are decreasing your capital, which is a negative for your business.

 Cash flow is an indicator of where you are spending your money and the future strength of your business. Small business owners generally do not realize the importance of comparing their past years Cash Flow Statements to measure their business growth. Some of them are ignorant of the basic rules that one should follow to compare their past Cash Flow Statement with the current one. So now that you are aware of these formulas take a few minutes and review your Cash Flow Statement. Compare it with last year and see how your business is progressing. You will be surprised at how much valuable information is contained in your Cash Flow Statement.



By: Linda Dawson

About the Author:

Margot Savala

In financial accounting, a cash flow statement or statement of cash flows is a financial statement that shows a company’s incoming and outgoing cash during a time period. All three statements are arranged from the same accounting information, but each statement serves its individual function. The statement of cash flow reports the movement of cash into and out of your business in a given year. Cash is the lifeblood of your company. The cash flow statement reports your business’ sources and uses of cash and the beginning and ending values for cash and cash equivalents each year. It also includes the combined total change in cash and cash equivalents from all sources and uses of cash.

Cash flow statements format planning involves forecasting and tabulating all significant cash inflows and analyzing the timing of expected payments in detail. We have highly skilled cash flow financing professionals prepare comprehensive periodic cash flow projections that can assist you in tasks such as budgeting, business planning and fund raising.

Advantages of the cash flow statement



Helps the newly formed companies to know their inflow and outflow of cash and thus prevent cash shortage

Helps the investors judge whether the company is financially sound

Cash flow statement records the inflow and outflow of cash over a period of time

We provides Cash Flow statements on monthly, quarterly, six monthly or yearly bases

Helps the company to know whether it will be able to cover payroll and other immediate expenses

These statements will be highly helpful for planning and management of future financial commitments



 

This helps them have an accurate analysis of the firm’s ability to meet its current liabilities. Our Accounting Firms possessing years of experience and expertise catering to the diverse requirements of global clients can help prepare periodic cash flow statements format – historical or projective.

These statements will be extremely helpful for planning and management of future financial commitments. Availing Cash Flow financing statements Format preparation support from us will act as a very useful money management tool that provides warnings in advance of periods of high expenditure and low sales. This is also a very important component in the application process for additional funding.



By: James Lee

About the Author:

Brandon Louras