Fundamentals of Financial Accounting 4th Edition by Fred Phillips,Robert Libby,Patricia Libby

Exercise 60

Internet-Based Team Research: Examining an Annual Report
As a team, select an industry to analyze. Using your Web browser, each team member should access the annual report or 10-K for one publicly traded company in the industry, with each member selecting a different company. (See Sl-3 in Chapter 1 for a description of possible resources for these tasks.)
Required:
1. On an individual basis, each team member should write a short report that incorporates the following:
a. Describe the depreciation methods used.
b. Compute the percentage of fixed asset cost that has been depreciated. What does this imply about the length of time the assets have been depreciated
c. Compute the fixed asset turnover ratios for the current and prior years. What does this tell you about the efficiency of the company's asset use
d. Describe the kinds of intangible assets, if any, that the company reports on the balance sheet.
2. Then, as a team, write a short report comparing and contrasting your companies using these attributes. Discuss any patterns across the companies that you as a team observe. Provide potential explanations for any differences discovered.