Study-Unit Description

Study-Unit Description


CODE MRK2211

 
TITLE Financial Aspects of Marketing

 
UM LEVEL 02 - Years 2, 3 in Modular Undergraduate Course

 
MQF LEVEL Not Applicable

 
ECTS CREDITS 3

 
DEPARTMENT Marketing

 
DESCRIPTION The study-unit will be organised around the following topics:

- Accounting as a Form of Communication;
- Financial statements and the Annual Report;
- Processing Accounting Information;
- Inventories and Cost of Goods Sold;
- Break-even analysis, marginal costing, absorption costing;
- Budgetary Control;
- The Statement of Cash Flows;
- Operating Assets;
- Current Liabilities versus Long-term Liabilities;
- Standard Costing and Variance Analysis;
- Assessment of Capital Projects;
- Responsibility accounting (Cost Centres, Profit Centres, Investment Centres)

Study-unit Aims

This unit considers what accounting is and who uses the information it provides. Accounting is seen as an important form of communication and that financial statements are the medium that accountants use to communicate with those who have an interest in the financial affairs of a company. In turn, these financial statements are essential tools in the planning and evaluation of marketing activities. The unit provides an overview of the accounting statements and of financial aspects of marketing decision-making such as forecasting, budgeting, optimising, valuing, and auditing results. Students will practice applying these tools to marketing decisions.

Learning Outcomes

1. Knowledge & Understanding:

By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to:
(1) Explain the purpose of each of the financial statements and the relationships among them and prepare a set of simple statements;
(2) Identify and explain the primary assumptions made in preparing financial statements;
(3) Use a classified balance sheet and a multiple-step income statement to analyze a company's operations;
(4) Read and use financial statements and other elements in the annual report of a publicly held company;
(5) Analyze the effects of the different costing methods on inventory, net income, income taxes, and cash flow;
(6) Use comparative financial statements to analyze a company over time and to compare various financial statement items;
(7) Compute and use various ratios to assess profitability;
(8) differentiate between standard costing and variance analysis;
(9) Assess the profitability of capital projects;
(10) Differentiate and design cost centres, profit centres and investment centres.

2. Skills:

By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to:
(1) Compute and use various ratios to assess liquidity, solvency and profitability;
(2) report on and analyze income statement items;
(3) Determine the strategies that could be used to increase the organization's profitability.

Main Text/s and any supplementary readings

Core Textbook:
Collier, P. M. (2012). Accounting for Managers: Interpreting accounting information for decision-making. Wiley.

Supplementary Textbook:

1) Marketing Finance: Turning Marketing Strategies into Shareholder Value by Keith Ward, published by Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann 2012.
2) Accounting and Finance for Non-Specialists by Peter Atrill and Eddie McLaney, 7th edition published by Prentice Hall 2011.

 
STUDY-UNIT TYPE Lecture and Tutorial

 
METHOD OF ASSESSMENT
Assessment Component/s Sept. Asst Session Weighting
Assignment Yes 30%
Examination (1 Hour and 30 Minutes) Yes 70%

 
LECTURER/S Peter Calleya
Joseph Micallef

 

 
The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints.
Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice.
It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2023/4. It may be subject to change in subsequent years.

https://www.um.edu.mt/course/studyunit