Business Accounts for Vodaphone

Table of Contents

 

Introduction. 2

Ratio Analysis. 3

Analysis of Ratios. 4

Company funding. 8

Qualitative issues. 10

Conclusion. 11

Appendices. 13

References. 19

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Introduction

Vodafone was founded in 1984 under the name Racal Telecom Limited as a subsidiary to the brand Rascal electronics. In 1991, the company merged with Rascal electronics to become and independent company called Vodafone Group Plc. Before the year 2005, Vodafone had over 150 million customers around the globe. In 2007, the company was the first company to sign an agreement with yahoo and Microsoft in order to provide instant messenger to its customers and making the mobile more like a computer. Customers could also check out EBay, MySpace, and Google maps as part of the service. The company has a total market share of over 25% in the UK a lone and has been named the largest industry in size in the UK. The industry has many competitors with whom Vodafone with have to fight to get the biggest market share. Major competitors in the market include; T-Mobile, O2, Orange and 3UK. Vodafone used to be number one until a few years ago when the spot was taken by O2. Vodafone continues to thrive in the UK market and is well known for its good network coverage in the country.

This Report will be divided into three main parts. The first part will be talking about financial ratios of Vodafone. This part of the report will look at two periods of the company and compare those periods in order to evaluate the business performance. The report is going to look at the main ratios that can be used to get a close idea on the performance of the business. Charts will also be used in order to represent the results well. The second part of the report will be looking at the company’s sources of funding. This will be evaluated using a pie chart and ratio for both years. The final part of the report will give an idea on qualitative issues in the company. This will mainly be on corporate social responsibility and making the environment safe.

 

 

 

 

 

Ratio Analysis

Ratio analysis shows the ratios shared between two variables or values taken from the financial data that are used by stakeholders to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the company (Dyson, 2004). It can be used to compare performance between companies, industries and between one period in a company and another (Glynn et al, 2008).

The main financial ratios that will be used to evaluate the performance of Vodafone include net profit margin, quick ratio, total asset turn over, Return on capital employed (ROCE), gearing ratio and Price earning ratio (P/E). Each ratio represents a different aspect of the company’s performance compared to the other ratios.

Table 1; Ratio analysis for Vodafone for the year 2008 and 2009

Ratio20092008
Net profit margin3,080   = 0.08

41017

6,756   = 0.19

35,478

Quick ratio13,029 – (412+2,868)  = 0.35

27,947

8,724 – (417+2,426)   = 0.27

21,973

Total asset turnover41,017   = 0.27

152,699

35478   = 0.28

127270

ROCE3,080   = 2%

124,752

6,756   = 5%

149,243

Debt ratio39,975 + 27,947 = 44%

152,699

28,826 + 21,973 = 40%

127,270

P/E ratio122.8   = 21.25p

5.78

150.9   = 26.20p

5.76

 

Analysis of Ratios

Despite an increase in revenue in Vodafone between 2008 and 2009, the company’s net profit margin fell from 0.19 to 0.08. This means from every £1 of revenue generated in 2008 the company made a profit of 0.19 pence in 2008 and 0.08 pence in 2009. This might have occurred because of increase expenses and an impairment of £5,900 that occurred in 2009 and not in 2008. This means the company is generating less profit from revenue than before and should therefore cut down on its expenses.

Figure 1; Net profit Margi

 

The company’s quick ration has increased from 0.3:1 to 0.4:1 from 2008 to 2009. Despite this increase, the company still can not meet its short term obligations. This means for every pound the company owes in short term loan, they can only pay 30p in 2008 and 40p in 2009. This is information is very important short term loan borrowers and also for suppliers because it shows if the company can pay its short term loan in case the rate of turnover is slow.

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 2; Quick Ratio

Total asset turnover for the company had a less significant fall from 0.27 to 0.28 in 2008 and 2009 respectively. This shows how much revenues can be generated from a £1 worth of total asset. This can be used to measure the performance of managers as it shows how efficient and effective managers manage their assets. ROCE fell between 2008 and 2009 from 5% to 2%. This means the company is barely making profits on its capital employed. This also shows how managers can manage operations and resources in the business.

Figure 3: Total asset Turnover

 

 

 

Figure 4: ROCE

 

Debt ratio increased from 40% in 2008 to 44% in 2009. This means the company is using more debt to finance its assets. In 2008, about 40% of the company’s assets where funded from debts and this increased to 44% in 2009. This shows managers are not doing enough to generate more current assets that could be used by the company.

Figure 4; Debt Ratio

 

Price earning ratios fell from 26.20p in 2008 to 21.25p in 2009. This means investors are paying less for stocks in 2009 than they did in 2008. This may be as a result of the fall in market price from 150.9 in 2008 to 122.8 in 2009.

 

Figure 6: P/E Ratio

Judging from the financial ratios, Vodafone in a general has not improved over the years. The company’s profits margins are very poor and they can not meet their immediate short term liability. This means the company may have to borrow in the short term in order to meet these obligations. Although this will increase the company’s debt, they have to think about meet short term obligations of the company. The ratios also indicate the company has been has almost half of its resources financed by debts. This is not a good sign for the company. The economic crises might have contributed to the poor results of the company as well. Therefore, managers should be alert and try to make good use of their resources so as to improve on the company’s result.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Company funding

 

Table 2; Sources of funding for the company

Source2008

£m

2009

£m

Called up share capital4,153.004,182.00
Capital redemption reserve10,101. 0010,054.00
Long term borrowings31,749.0022,662.00
Deferred tax liabilities6,642.005,109.00
Post employment benefits240.00104.00
Provisions533.00306.00
Trade and other payables811.00645.00
54,229.0043,062.00

 

The table above shows that most of the company’s funding came from long term borrowings. This is mostly from banks, overdraft, bonds, and others. Reserve is the second largest source of funding for the company from the financial report, it could be seen that the company still hold bonds that are hold mature from 2010 and some until 2032. The company has over three billion US dollar bonds and over 750 euro bonds. Within one year alone, the company borrowed £950 million brings the total money from bank loans as at 31 march 2009 to £6,052 million. The reason for an increase in the long term borrowing could be because of the exchange rate. The exchange rate for the starling dropped between 2008 and 2009. It became less valuable and at a certain point almost the same as the euro. Prices of goods and service also increased. This means the cost of goods and services might have increased during that period to cause the company to borrow more to finance activities.

Post employment benefits are still considered funds because they have not been paid out and therefore still used in the company. Vodafone operates a number of pension plans that employees can earn.

The most appropriate was to explain this is by using the debt ratio. In the first part of the report: the debt ratio for 2008 and 2009 where 40% and 44%. This indicates that 44% of assets are being fined by debt. This is not a very good way of measuring the company’s ability to use available resources to generate profits and revenues in the business. If 44% of a company’s debts are fund the company’s that means the company the company has 66% of their personal funds to finance other resources and operation.

Evaluating  and analysing the debt ratio will help the company to know if they need more fund to fine a project and also how much they will need. This information is very useful to investors and share holders. This information tells shareholders if the company is a successful or not and is they can still buy shares from the company. A poor debt ratio might lead to the company liquidating its asses to pay their long term obligations.

Figure 7; 2008 debt funding

 

Figure 8; 2009 debt funding

This indicated why the company has a very high debt ratio. The company has borrowed from a lot of sources in order to finance its assets. The company needs to cut down on these debts in order to reduce the risk of liquidating its assets in order to pay for the debts. This can be done my making maximum use of assets to generate sales and profit in order to pay for these debts.

Qualitative issues

Corporate social responsibility refers to the way in which a company conducts itself with respect to its environment (Collier, 2003). Every company strives to operate its activities in a manner so as to benefit the environment in which it operates in; Vodafone is no exception. In an attempt to achieve this sustainable environment, Vodafone plc has adopted a number of strategies which will be discussed in this section. Firstly, as part of the company’s climate strategy, Vodafone has steered towards the production of goods and services which aims to help customers limit their own emissions (Vodafone.com, 2008) For instance, it aims to develop new products such as solar powered phone chargers as well as universal phone chargers to be used with Vodafone branded handsets (Vodafone.com, 2008). Secondly, Vodafone announced that by 2020, it aims to reduce its CO2 emissions by 50% by improving its energy efficiency and its use of renewable energy (Vodafone.com, 2008). The results of all this will bring about cost reduction. (Vodafone.com, 2008) The company aims to drive through these operational and technological changes and ultimately cut carbon emissions (Vodafone.com, 2008). They also intend to use renewable energy when and where necessary. For instance, in 2006/7 Vodafone reduced the amount of carbon dioxide by 29% and it improved the energy efficiency of new network equipment by 25% (Vodafone.com, 2008).

Vodafone has come together with other mobile operators to reduce the impact of carbon dioxide emission in to the atmosphere by working with suppliers to improve the efficiency of energy and participating as an active member of the climate change group (Vodafone.com, 2008). The company also encourages electronic communication with shareholders in order to create an environmentally friendly place (Vodafone.com, 2008). The company also uses environmentally friend materials to print reports. The group also sets standards for its suppliers to make the purchasing process more ethical and environmentally friendly. Customers buying phones from Vodafone will always get a bag for them to put and send their old mobile phones. This helps the company to recycle the phone and reduce the amount of waste.

Conclusion

This report has looked at Vodafone and its major achievements over the year. The first part of this report looked at the company’s financial analysis. The major financial analysis of the company was chosen in order to make comparison between two periods in the company. This was used to evaluate the company’s performance between 2008 and 2009. The second part of the report talks about the company’s funding what sources of finance the company has used in order to fund its major resourced. This part of the report also talked about debt ratio and how it can be used to know how much of company’s resources have been financed by debt. The final part of the report talked about the company’s corporate social responsibility and what steps they have taken on the past years to contribute in saving the environment.

These analyses that have been made in both part one and two of the report shows that a company can make profits but still be in serious trouble if they cannot manage resources well. By looking at the financial analysis of the company, it can be seen that they are not doing well internally to utilise their resources efficiently. In conclusion, financial analysis is just one of the ways to measure the performance of a company. Despite the many ways used to measure performance, financial analysis is the most important indicator and can be used to evaluate a company’s management, performance and the probability of survival in an intensely competitive age.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Appendices

RatioFormuladefinition
 

Net profit margin

 

Net profit

Total revenue

This shows how much profit is made from £1 of revenue generated in a business
 

Quick ratio

 

Current assets – (inventory + Prepayments)

Current liabilities

This shows the ability of a company to meet its immediate short term obligations.
Total asset turnover 

Total revenue

Total assets

 

This shows how much revenue can be generated from £1 of assets employed in the business
ROCENet Profit

Capital employed (Total asset-Current liabilities)

Shows how much profit the company is making from a portion of their investment.
Debt ratio 

Total liability

Total assets

This shows the proportion of the business that has been funded by loans that still have to be paid
P/E ratioCurrent Market share

Earnings per share (EPS)

This shows how well the company is performing compared to its market

 

Consolidated income statement
20092008
£m£m
Non-current assets
Goodwill53,95851,336
Other intangible assets20,98018,995
Property, plant and equipment19,25016,735
Investments in associated undertakings34,71522,545
Other investments7,0607,367
Deferred tax assets630436
Post employment benefits865
Trade and other receivables3,0691,067
Total Non-current asset139,670118,546
Current assets
Inventory412417
Taxation recoverable7757
Trade and other receivables7,6626,551
Cash and cash equivalents4,8781,699
Total Current assets13,0298,724
Total assets152,699127,270
Equity
Called up share capital4,1534,182
Share premium account43,00842,934
Own shares held-8,036-7,856
Additional paid-in capital100,239100,151
Capital redemption reserve10,10110,054
Accumulated other recognised income and expense20,51710,558
Retained losses-83,820-81,980
Total equity shareholders’ funds86,16278,043
Minority interests1,7871,168
Written put options over minority interests-3,172-2,740
Total minority interests-1,385-1,572
Total equity84,77776,471
Non-current liabilities
Long term borrowings31,74922,662
Deferred tax liabilities6,6425,109
Post employment benefits240104
Provisions533306
Trade and other payables811645
Total non-current liabilities39,97528,826
Current liabilities
Short term borrowings9,6244,532
Current taxation liabilities4,5525,123
Provisions373356
Trade and other payables13,39811,962
Total current Liabilities27,94721,973
Total equity and liabilities152,699127,270

 

Income statement
20092008
£m£m
Revenue41,017.0035,478.00
Cost of sales-25,842.00-21,890.00
Gross profit15,175.0013,588.00
Selling and distribution expenses-2,738.00-2,511.00
Administrative expenses-4,771.00-3,878.00
Share of result in associated undertakings4,091.002,876.00
Impairment losses-5,900.00
Other income and expense-28.00
Operating profit/(loss)5,857.0010,047.00
Non-operating income and expense-44.00254.00
Investment income795.00714.00
Financing costs-2,419.00-2,014.00
Profit/(loss) before taxation4,189.009,001.00
Income tax expense-1,109.00-2,245.00
Profit/(loss) for the financial year from continuing operations3,080.006,756.00
Loss for the financial year from discontinued operations
Profit/(loss) for the financial year3,080.006,756.00
Attributable to:
– Equity shareholders30786660
– Minority interests296
30806756
Basic earnings/(loss) per share
Profit/(loss) from continuing operations5.84p12.56p
Loss from discontinued operations
Profit/(loss) for the financial year5.84p12.56p
Diluted earnings/(loss) per share
Profit/(loss) from continuing operations5.81p12.50p
Loss from discontinued operations
Profit/(loss) for the financial year5.81p12.50p

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

References

    • Dyson, J. R. (2004). Accounting for Non-Accounting Students; Sixth Edition. Prentice Hall, Harlow
    • Glynn, J. et al (2008). Accounting for Managers; Fourth Edition. Cengage Learning EMEA
    • Collier, P. M. (2003). Accounting for Managers: Interpreting Accounting Information for Decision-making. Wiley