A Cross-Industry Analysis of Financial Ratios: Comparabilities and Corporate Performance

This book provides evidence on the comparability of financial ratios across several industries, assessing the similarity or dissimilarity of ratios among industry taxonomies, or groups of ratios. This work surveys a wide variety of both manufacturing and retail corporations, and determines the classification patterns of their respective financial ratios. The taxonomies of 32 ratios, in seven representative industries, are examined for the ten-year period from 1978 through 1987. Two introductory chapters detail the nature of the research, the data utilized, variables employed, and statistical methodologies, as well as providing a brief summary of the results. A third chapter furnishes results for the entire economy by factors of return, cash flow, cash position, inventory, sales, liquidity, and debt; while seven separate chapters describe the study’s conclusions for each of the primary industries; automobile and aerospace; chemical, rubber, and oil; electronics; food; retail; steel; and textile. The work concludes with a summary of the study and its conclusions, and an examination of the limitations of the type of research and possibilities for its extension.