On 14th September 2024, a unique corporate course -——‘Showing you the essence of business from financial statements’ was successfully held in the International Business of the Business School of Shenzhen University of Technology. The course was attended by experts from the Shenzhen branch of Ping An Integrated Financial Services.

Picture 1 Ping An Bank financial enterprise lecture event

At the beginning of the course, Ms. Chen Xi, a senior expert in the field of financial statements, gave us an in-depth and concise introduction to the relevant knowledge. She firstly emphasised the importance of financial statements as an indispensable tool for business management, pointing out that these statements, far from being a simple list of data, are a true reflection of the operating activities of the enterprise and are a key indicator for evaluating the health status of an enterprise. Ms Chen Xi further explained that a detailed reading of the three core financial statements - balance sheet, income statement and cash flow statement - not only reveals an enterprise's assets and liabilities, revenues and expenditures, but also accurately reflects an enterprise's cash flow direction during a specific period of time. This is crucial for judging the solvency, profitability and efficiency of capital operation of an enterprise, and provides the necessary data support for enterprise managers to make strategic decisions. Through such analyses, the management can better grasp the current status of the enterprise's operation and predict the future development, so as to make more informed business decisions.

Picture 2 Ping An Bank expert explain case to students

During the presentation, Yao Lianying, a senior financial expert from Ping An Bank, vividly demonstrated how to find out the strengths and weaknesses of an enterprise from its financial statements by combining the cases of an insurance subject - HB Life Insurance Enterprise, an investment subject - YYDS New Energy Group, and a service subject - Luo Dapang Insurance Brokerage Company, and so on. For example, by analysing the asset structure in the balance sheet, we can understand the asset quality and operational efficiency of the enterprise; from the income statement, we can judge the profitability and market competitiveness of the enterprise; while the cash flow statement provides a dynamic perspective for the enterprise, which can reveal the cash inflow and outflow of the enterprise, and reflect the solvency and liquidity of the enterprise.

Picture 3 Students listen the case analysis attentively

In order to deepen students' understanding and application ability, Yao Lianying expert cleverly introduced a role-play teaching session, inviting students to play the roles of investment managers and shareholders respectively. This interactive learning method allows students to practice in a simulated investment environment, by personally analysing the financial data, a deeper understanding of the value of financial statements for corporate decision-making. In addition, the teacher also guided the students to compare and analyse the financial statements of different companies in the same industry, so as to highlight their respective strengths and weaknesses, and to help the students establish a comprehensive and three-dimensional evaluation system for the financial health of enterprises. This series of teaching activities not only enhanced students' understanding of the importance of financial statements, but also laid a solid foundation for them to deal with complex financial issues in their future work.

Picture 4 Ping An Bank expert summarize the key knowledges about lecture

The success of this course provided a rare learning opportunity for the students, who expressed that through this course, they had a deep understanding of financial statements and mastered the methods and skills of looking at the business substance from financial statements, and would make better use of the financial statement analysis tools in their future studies to provide strong support for the subsequent knowledge analysis.

Typesetting:Zeng huiqi，Chen xi

Copywriter: Zeng huiqi, Chen xi

Photo by: Wang yunxia

Review: Wang yunxia