Financial Analysis & Forecasting
About This Class
- 22 – 24 May
- Live Online Training
- 12 Lessons
Thorough forecasting of the financial performance of a business is key to its success. Both established companies and small enterprises depend on financial forecasting and analysis to determine the allocation of their resources in addressing expected expenditures ahead. This intense 3- day interactive masterclass goes beyond the typical financial analysis courses. It uses both the principles of analysis and the power of Excel to identify the strategic drivers that can enhance the shareholder value of your organization.
Using Excel, delegates will learn how to master the tools and techniques it provides to apply the latest financial analysis techniques, understand what the numbers are revealing, and be better able to make strategic and tactical decisions and predict the outcome of these decisions. The masterclass proceeds from basic financial analysis to more advanced techniques for determining the cost of capital, methods of projecting the benefit of capital projects, Also, using Excel, delegates will learn how to evaluate organizations with which they are planning to do business, and determine if they are able to provide strategic strength to their companies.
Participants are encouraged to ask as many questions as possible, to develop their knowledge by enquiry. The presentation will be delivered online, in an intensive, inclusive, and informal manner. It will be a combination of the instructor’s presentations, interspersed with case study material, tutorial videos, and exercise files so you can practice what you would have learnt.
Local Fee
R 17,999
International Fee
$ 1,300
Download Brochure
Why You Should Attend
On completion of this masterclass delegates should be able to:
- Understand the principles forming the foundation of financial analysis
- Use the powerful tools in Excel such as the Financial and Statistical functions and tools such as the Data Analysis toolbox, and Sensitivity analysis tools and Scenario's
- Analyse a company's annual report identifying key performance indicators to understand what the numbers are really saying and make projections of future performance and benchmark corporate performance against peer groups and industry statistics
- Analyse risks using scenarios and sensitivity analysis
- Analyse time series data and develop forecasts
- Use Excel with more confidence and flexibility, thus saving large amounts of time and enhancing productivity
- Learn about future trends in forecasting
- Know the purpose of forecasting and its role in strategic planning
Day 1
• What is financial analysis?
• What is forecasting?
• Objectives of financial analysis
• Overview of the global business environment
• Organisational Planning Models
• The Product/Decision/Information Cycle
• Key performance indicators
• Balanced scorecard
• The financial reporting process and IFRS
• IFRS vs. Cash How to spot accounting irregularities in financial statements
• Financial components to determine business health
• Understanding the business
• Going through the ABCs of the balance sheet
• Going through the ABCs of the income statement
• Going through the ABCs of the cash flow statement
• How profitability and risk affect financial forecasting
• Functions
o Logical functions
o Lookup and reference
o Financial
• Tools
o Scenarios
o What-if
o Auditing
o Data Analysis
• XBRL
Day 2
• Rolling forecasts and variance analysis
• Key financial ratios to analyse financials
• Analysing financial forecasts using ratio analysis
• What is the annual report?
• Ratio Analysis The heart of Financial Analysis
• Use Excel templates to calculate and interpret liquidity, leverage and Profitability ratios
• Special formulas
o The DuPont Formula
o How to use the Altman Z-Score
• Benchmarking the results of financial analysis
• Other performance measures
• Show how changes in sales, expenses, and assets affect an organisation’s ROI (DOL, DFL)
• Scenarios analysis uses and limitations demonstrated
• Sensitivity analysis (cause and effect connections) uses and limitations demonstrated
Day 3
• Principles of risk measurement in individual shares
• Graphing expected return and risk using variance analysis
• Modern portfolio theory using the capital asset pricing model
• Use Excel® to determine the beta of listed share on a securities market. Balancing a portfolio – Goal Seek
• Key features of long-term investment decisions
• Measuring economic returns using financial statement data
• Working the cost of capital into the equation
• Measuring economic returns from a cash-based perspective
• Present and future values
• Defining the discount factor
• Exercises: Discounting calculations
• NPV’s and varying future cash flows
• Perpetuities and annuities
• Exercises: Annuities and perpetuities
• Introduction to project analysis
• Developing a forecast of the project cash flows
• Identifying the key risk areas
• Discounted cash flow techniques
• Calculating the internal rate of return
Who should attend
All financial professionals including those who are responsible for ensuring the effective use and management of corporate funds. Also, sales and marketing professionals, research professionals, and anyone who needs to understand the short and long-term financial impact of key decisions. Participants should have a basic understanding of financial statements and may bring their own laptop with a full installation of Excel, including the complete “Toolbox”.
- CFOs / Financial Directors / Executives
- Financial Accountants
- Financial Managers
- Financial Controllers
- Financial Analysts
- Business Analysts
- Credit Analysts
- Equity Analysts
- Accounts Officers
- Treasurers
- Commercial Bankers
- Project Managers
- Internal & External Auditors
Expert Trainer
The trainer for this course is a Chartered Accountant (SA), Associate Chartered Management Accountant, Chartered Global Management Accountant, with strong academic and industry experience. She holds a Master’s degree in Management Accounting and has more than nine years of lecturing experience at the University of Pretoria and North-West University respectively, for which she has received distinctive teaching awards.
As a lecturer, she specialised in Management Accounting, Costing, Financial Management and Business Strategy to students of various levels. This is besides providing business simulations, supervising research projects and external moderation and reviewing of other universities’ exam papers and study guides.
She has been delivering training to both government institutions and private sector companies in similar subject areas, including Microsoft Excel, financial and business skills training, as well as consultation in fields related to financial modelling in Excel, optimising power tools in Excel and Power BI.
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