Solution:
So here are five practical steps to start learning finance and business:

Read an introductory book on personal finance
In my opinion, starting with personal finance is a good way to learn finance and business. It is from personal finance that you get the most applicable ideas for your life. Isn’t it ironic if you know a lot about finance and business but have your own personal finance in a mess?

So I’d recommend reading a book that introduces you to all important aspects of personal finance. For this purpose, I like the book Personal Finance by Kapoor, Dlabay and Hughes. It is very readable, and cover all important aspects of personal finance like budgeting, consumer credit, housing, insurance, investing, and retirement. The book is also very scannable; you can easily scan through it to grasp the main ideas of every part.
The book is expensive ($132.19), but I borrow it from the library for free. If you can’t get it, don’t worry, you can always read other books. The bottom line is the book should introduce you to all important aspects of personal finance.

Subscribe to a personal finance blog
Subscribing to a personal finance blog will help you apply the principles of personal finance in your daily life. It will remind you of the principles you have learned, help you learn new principles, and most importantly help you put those principles into practice. The blog I like is Get Rich Slowly. The tips and experiences shared there are very useful and practical.

Subscribe to a personal finance podcast
Similar to my previous point about blog, subscribing to a personal finance podcast is a good way to help you put personal finance principles into practice. The podcast I like is Money Girl. It’s short (often less than five minutes), very easy to understand and contains a lot of practical tips.

Subscribe to a business podcast
Now we move from personal finance to finance and business in general. A good way to start is subscribing to a business podcast. There are many business podcasts, but the one I like most is HBR Ideacast for one simple reason: it gives me preview of the newest business ideas.
The podcast often features interview with the authors of new business books. By listening to this podcast alone, I can quickly get the main ideas of those books. In some cases, I get enough from the podcast that I no longer need to read those books. It saves me a lot of time while keeping me up-to-date with the newest concepts in the business world.

Read an introductory book on finance and business
Eventually, to get deeper knowledge about finance and business, there is no choice but to read “real” finance and business books. By “real” here I mean something that uses those jargons MBAs talk about in their conversations about business.
Fortunately, there are books that can help you get there in relatively short time. The book I like is The Ten-Day MBA by Steven Silbiger. This book introduces you to all important aspects of finance and business like marketing, accounting, economics, and strategy. It gives you enough knowledge to understand the conversations in finance and business world.

These five steps should give you strong enough foundation in finance and business. However, if you want to move beyond these five steps, I’d recommend reading the books listed in the Personal MBA. The list contains 42 books and periodicals which aim to give you finance and business knowledge comparable to someone taking an MBA program.

Image source:

http://www.glassdoor.com

Most people need help with their investment decisions. It is not easy to try and decide how to invest money that you have worked hard for. You want to make the right decision and you don’t want to loose your money.

The point behind investing is to make your money work for you. You worked for it now it is time for the pay back. The question is just how hard do you want your money to work? This is known as your risk profile. If you try to get your money working too hard the risk is that you will loose it. The rule of thumb is that the higher the return, the more risk associated with the investment.

So who is going to help you make your decisions? I would suggest to you now that you are only one who can decide your risk profile. You know just how much risk you are prepare to take on.

You might think an investment adviser will tell you what to invest in and how to invest in the various investment vehicles. Some people go down this track and fully believe that this is the only way to invest. Just hand it all over to an investment advisor. I believe that this is the wrong approach to getting investment help.

Ultimately, the decision about how to invest and what to invest in must be yours. If you see that your investment adviser is a millionaire and has a lifestyle to be envied, by all means just do what he says to do. But if he is not, then he must be looked at carefully and his advise considered carefully.

An investment adviser can assist you with information. He has access to information that you do not. He can recommend funds and various investments that are performing well at the present. He cannot tell you how those investments will perform in the future. This decision is yours, and at the best it will an educated guess and as good as anybody else who wants to give an educated guess.

Knowledge is power. The knowledge you will gain from your investment adviser will be extremely helpful in making your decision. You must look for other sources of this knowledge.

So where can you find this information?

Look to financial newspapers and web sites. Read as much as you can, and educate your self about your investment area. Find somebody who is wealthy and at the appropriate time ask them how they made their investment decisions. Learn from the mistakes of others. It is a far less costly way to learn. Go to financial investment seminars. Talk to people about their investment strategies and their sources of financial information.

When you look for investment help, look for information to learn. Do not seek out the most profitable investment. You may find it, but there is no guarantee that is will be profitable when you invest in it. The information and knowledge you gather from these sources will most likely give you the results you seek, and is therefore more valuable than a hot tip in the market.

Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/finance-articles/how-to-get-investment-help-400288.html
Author: Mika Hamilton

Image source:

http://financecp.com

Starting a student investment club begins with the desire to invest. An adult should start and run the club and provide structure and guidance along the way. Properly used, however, the student investment club will be a good learning experience for everyone.

1. Begin with a simple goal’s to provide kids with limited ability to search and select stocks to invest. Ensure that younger kids have their parent’s permission to participate. Come up with weekly or monthly goals for investing.

2. Write rules and stick to them. Investment clubs need rules and regulations and the student investment club is no exception. This helps to establish order and ensure that things are handled properly. Write the rules in plain language that can be easily understood by the age group.

3. Limit the investments. Children have limited funds so there should be low limits on the participation requirements as well as limits to the amount the child can invest. Get the buy-in of the parents before you begin. Always consider the amount of money available to students before you choose investments.

4. Make investments fun. The idea of investments can seem somewhat a dreary subject. Spice it up by allowing kids to invest in companies that they know or have heard about. Think about popular toy or video game companies, food or restaurant companies or clothing companies. Investing in a stodgy company they never heard of and don’t know the nature of business will make the club boring and kids will lose interest quickly.

5. Encourage kids to use their own money. When appropriate the students will learn better when they use their own money. Whether it’s from their allowance or from a part-time job, using their own money will force kids to be more interested in the investments.

6. Invite guest speakers. Whenever possible try to add interest by inviting guest speakers to meetings with the students. Find members of the local community to speak such as investment bankers, finance counselors or accountants.

7. Divide students into smaller groups. If you have a large group of students, it may be wise to have them form smaller groups. Allow them to form a corporation for investing and even let them name their company. Have them choose a president and then let them vote on investment choices.

8. Track investment performance. Teach students to use charts or graphs to track their investments and keep abreast with market trends in the newspaper or on the internet. Determine a specific day in a week to review investments with the students.

Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/fitness-articles/how-to-start-a-student-investment-club-252081.html
Author: Alvin Toh

Image source:

http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org

Stocks are pieces of ownership in a company. Also called shares, they represent a part of the shareholder’s interest in the company’s profits and assets, but not necessarily liabilities.

Some stocks earn you a regular payout, called a dividend – which is your reward for investing your money in that stock. You can also sell stocks at a higher price than the one you bought them for to make a profit.

The stock market is like an auction house where shares are bought and sold and buyers and sellers determine a price by bidding on stocks.

Stock prices fluctuate, sometimes wildly, during the day of trade, as buyers and sellers drive the stock’s demand and supply.

Companies don’t trade stock directly; instead once they have offered the stock to the public in an Initial Public Offering, they then let buyers and sellers directly determine demand without interference.

A stock exchange is a place that facilitates the trade of stock.

When you want to buy stock in a company, you call a brokerage firm and open an account with them. Alternatively you can use an online broker.

To set up an account with a brokerage, you need proof of identity – social security or drivers’ license.

Generally, greater risk in the stock market means a higher return, although this isn’t always true.

Stock tables appear in your daily newspaper and contain important information to help you monitor your stocks – you should read this everyday.

Your personal finances should be in good shape and you should have some spare cash for stock investing as it can be a time-confusing, and for the novice, risky venture.

You should read books, magazines and internet articles on stock market tutorials to better acquaint yourself with the market’s dynamics.

The three main stock indexes in the US are the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the NASDAQ, and the S&P 500.

The main stock exchange in the US is the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), where most blue-chip stocks are listed.

A company’s stock cannot be traded at the exchange if it is not first listed on that exchange.

The stock market is a place of much fervent daily activity. It’s constantly in the news and very sensitive to changes in the world’s economic and political climate. To make sense of it, you must give yourself at least 6 months to a year to fully understand its intricate workings. You can, however, begin to start investing small amounts and learn as you invest because after all, experience is the best teacher. This stock market tutorial should have given you an idea of the basics; now you can easily explore the concepts outlined here in more depth for greater understanding and ultimately higher returns.

Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/investing-articles/a-quick-stock-market-tutorial-15-tips-for-beginners-1695806.html
Author: Kelly Clifford

Related post:
stages in the routine
the balance sheet
final account
revenue account
balnace sheet purpose
reserves
provision
prepayments
accruals
outstandings
adjustment for final account
summarised revenue account
profit and loss
subdivision revenue account
journal proper
sales journal

Contingent liabilities should be noted on the Balance Sheet but need not be entered in the accounts until they become real liabilities. It is, however, desirable that some provision or reserve should be made out of profits to meet contingent liabilities where they are considerable.

b. Capital commitments
It is also desirable (and in fact obligatory under the Companies Act) that the Balance Sheet should contain a note of the value of commitments which have been entered into for the purchase of fixed assets or other commitments on capital account. Whilst such commitments do not affect current results they will clearly have an effect on future costs and available cash.

Again, the goods sold during the period may have been produced partly in the previous period; some of the goods used in the production of the current period may not be sold until a future period.

The cost of material used in production forms part of the cost of production for the period. The cost of production includes the cost of completed articles and also be cost of partly finished goods or work in progress. The value of unfinished work must therefore be deducted from the cost of production for the purpose of arriving at the cost of completed production for sale.

Part of the cost of completed production may consist of work done and costs incurred in the previous period of account, and such amount will be represented by the work in progress or stock of unfinished goods which existed at the beginning of the account period. This opening figure of stocks of work in progress must therefore be added to the current cost of production. Reference should be made to the section headed Manufacturing Account for an example of the procedure.

Having in this way arrived at the cost of completed production during the period (the sum to be credited to the Manufacturing Account and debited to the Trading Account) there remains the question of finding the cost of sales; for profit consists of the difference between sales and their cost.

To the cost of completed production transferred to the Trading Account from the Manufacturing Account there must be added the stock of finished goods not sold at the end of the previous period. Similarly, the stock of completed goods not sold at the end of the period under review must be deducted from the total of costs now appearing in the Trading Account.

The revenue accounts, whose purpose is eventually to show the profit or loss for a period, and the way in which the profit or loss is disposed of, are normally subdivided where necessary as follows:
Manufacturing account
Trading account
Profit and loss account
Appropriation account

Variants of these conventional headings are used for particular purposes and for particular types of organizations. Thus, Assurance companies prepare revenue accounts for each main class of business; non-profit-making organization prepare income and expenditure accounts; operating statements are prepared, not necessarily for publication, by many industrial organization to cover various processes or subvidisions of the main work of the concern.

The manufacturing account
The manufacturing accounts follows:
1. The objects of the accounts
As the terms implies, a manufacturing account is prepared by a producing organization and the objects of the account is to show :
a. The total cost of production during the period
b. The manufacturing cost of the finished output which is put into finished good store.

2. The application of the manufacturing account for costing purpose
If an industrial unit produces only one uniform product,, then obviously the average factory or direct cost of producing that product can be ascertained by the simple process of dividing the total factory cost as shown in the manufacturing account by the number of articles produced during the period.

3. The form of the account
(to be continue….)

The main or control ledger is thus the chief accountant’s personal instrument for watching the progress of the concern and reporting on the results to top management. He should be aware by a rapid scrutiny of the accounts of any trend or change in the financial position which requires immediate investigation; and by the use of a control ledger containing the minimum of accounts he would not be misled by masses of detailed information from which such accounts were made up.

The immediate source from which entries are made in such a control ledger are subsidiary books analyzed so as to group items into, say, monthly totals for posting to the control accounts.

Detailed information is obtainable from subsidiary ledger systems, each self-balancing in itself and each controlled by an account in the main or control ledger.

Subsidiary ledger systems of this nature include a debtors’ ledger with an account for each debtor, and analogous to the sales ledger, except that a debtors’ ledger contains all debtors, not merely those resulting from sales. Similarly, a creditors’ ledger includes all creditors’ ledger is not limited to suppliers’ accounts. Further subsidiary ledger systems can, as necessary, be created to show various types of fixed assets, stocks, material purchases and any analysis of other expenses which may be required.

When the boot and shoe repairer, referred to earlier, buys leather from supplier he will at some stage surrender cash and receive a stock of leather in return. When he repairs a shoe he will surrender the use of this time, that of his employees, his tools and his premises, and in return he will again cash or a debt representing the price of his work.

Thus every transaction must be recorded twice in an accounting system, in the one case recording the gain of an asset and in the other the loss or liability.

Such a method of accounting enables a full record to be kept of every asset and liability and every gain or loss of assets or liabilities. IT HAS THE ADDITIONAL ADVANTAGE OF PROVIDING AN AUTOMATIC CHECK ON the arithmetical accuracy of the accounting, for the total assets must be made to agree with the total liabilities (including owner’s capital). Capital will be treated as a liability of the business to the owner or owners for the purpose of this automatic check.

Development in the application of accounting techniques to assist all grades of management have, however, expanded this original view of the accounting function. One of the most important tasks of modern accounting is to assist management in achieving efficiency by the presentation of suitable financial information. Such information will be designed primarily to assist management in making its future plans and controlling the execution of those plans.
It is therefore essential that every manager, whatever may be his function or status, should understand clearly the principles of accounting and have a good working knowledge of its mechanics.

A manager must appreciate the extent and limitations of the information which he may demand of the accountant, and he should have a broad knowledge of the cost of producing it. Whilst a good accountant will always help in the interpretation of figures, the final assessment must rest with management, In the end the value of accounting information depends on the action which it calls forth from the managers of a business.