Finance Essentials For Communicators

What You Will Learn:

• The Big Picture
• Capital markets overview
• The perspectives of financial audiences
• Sell-side analysts and the role of guidance
• Corporate Finance Essentials
• Creating shareholder value – what it really means
• The link to return on capital
• Metrics for executive compensation
• Characteristics of debt and equity funding
• Cost of capital and the capital mix
• The impact of leverage/gearing
• Changing the capital structure
• Telling the story
• Accounting Essentials
• The key financial statements and how they fit together
• The FinanceTalking accounting board game
• The difference between profits and cash
• Depreciation, amortisation and EBITDA
• Goodwill and impairment
• Using adjusted/non-GAAP numbers
• Annual Reports & earnings releases – how analysts, investors and journalists use your financial information
• Analysing Financial Information
• Reviewing the balance sheet
• Gearing/leverage ratios
• Working capital management
• Communicating balance sheet strength
• Views of ratings agencies and other credit analysts
• Analysing Financial Information Cont’d
• Income statement headline numbers
• Analysing the income statement and asking questions
• Establishing a trend – how analysts adjust your numbers
• Constant currency and other underlying numbers
• Growth and margins, operational leverage/gearing
• Earnings per share and dividends
• How the numbers tell the story
• Building a story using key performance indicators
• Media and analysts conference case studies
• Valuation
• Context for investment decision-making (economics)
• Evaluating growth potential
• Valuation basics – discounted cash flow techniques
• Analysts’ models – how they work
• The importance of managing expectations
• Using communications to influence DCF valuation
• Valuing a company using multiples
• What might change a multiple?
• Using communications to influence multiples
• How to Tell your Investment Story
• Management’s task
• Telling the story in terms of what really matters
• Summary & Conclusion
• Where to go from here