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IL&FS Fiasco and Accounting Statements

Recently, the entire nation has been shocked to see that the institution of the…

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Recently, the entire nation has been shocked to see that the institution of the size, scale and reputation like IL&FS has defaulted on its interest obligations.

It is noteworthy that IL&FS was considered to be one of the most reputed borrowers in India and perceived to be a Government backed institution. We have to understand that what makes such a large institution fail. There may be many reasons, but in the context of this article let us look at the accounting statements only.

Following is a summarized consolidated financial statements highlights of IL&FS in recent past.

Accounting statement

Now we have to understand the items line by line. Because, at Super 20 Training Institute, our aim is to understand these items from a practical perspective. And you are aware that it is the best accounting institute in Ahmedabad. Many accounting institutes in Ahmedabad focus on teaching books. Rather S20 as an Accounting Training Institute has set a benchmark by focussing on such case study based practical approach in learning accounting, taxation, tally, GST etc.

It is apparent that the company was the anyways troubled one looking at the above numbers. The company was borrowing at a fast pace and this has resulted into the highest ever interest expenses being borne by the company. The company’s operating profits are decreasing on one side and on the other side the company’s interest expenses shot up drastically by 21%. The sole reason for this difference was that the company continued to borrow funds from the markets and mostly they were short-term borrowings. As you may be aware that in recent past the short-term interest rates are much higher compared to long-term interest rates. Company’s projects were mostly long-term in nature so they had to ideally raise funds from longer term papers. But the company did the contrary.

So, net if you see revenues of the firm were up by 9% in last one year. That looks quite rosy. Now if we look at the operating profits we have a doubt. Operating profits were down by -13%. That means something is seriously wrong. On rising revenues, the company had negative operating profits.

The company’s depreciation was also not in line with the expectations. It was up about 20%. There also somebody needs to dig deeper. And ultimately that has resulted into the company making cash losses as well as accounting losses. This is very alarming and fishy and only some drastic or magical steps can save this company that we can infer.

Friends, we will examine this case from a financial and accounting ratio analysis perspective in my next article. But as of now what we have understood is that the company was troubled operationally as well as financially. If you do not understand any of this topic discussed above you can approach team S20 for more clarity and understanding. You can also write to us at info@s20.in. We provide people of any background a simple, effective and practical training in Accounting, Taxation, GST, Tally. You can know more about our courses at www.s20.in/courses