Four Publicly-Traded Companies

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that publicly-traded companies, by law and in compliance with the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC), must submit financial statements to the SEC and to their shareholders in accordance with Standard Accounting Practices and Auditing Procedures dictated by standards established by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. The author points out that PepsiCo and the Gillette Company present different reporting styles; although both meet and far exceed all reporting requirements, the Gillette Company "plays it very close to the vest" by restricting the distribution of their data concerning their operations such as presenting their "Costs of Goods Sold" figures as muddled as they can keep them legally. The paper concludes that the consensus from this analysis of these four companies is that their current ratio trends should continue over the next two to four years, with the possible exception of Bausch & Lomb, which must address its stiff competition or continue to suffer the company's downward trend.

From the Paper:

"Bausch & Lomb publish their Returns on Equity, a dismal 6.4%, and 43.86% below the Industry Average. In addition, their published Returns on Assets also are dismal at 2.1%, and 56.25% below the Industry Average, with their Returns on Inventory Costs equally bad at 4.7%, and 37.33% below Industry Average. This company is the only one of the four to publish data usable to calculate these returns. All three of the others do not publish the information; for security reasons, both government enforced and self imposed therefore these numbers are impossible to compute for them in any comparative format."

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