Problem

Financial Statement Research for a Publicly-Traded Merchandising Company

Access the latest annual report, or Form 10-K, of a publicly-traded merchandising company of your choice using the company's website or http://www.sec.gov. You can usually access from a company's website by clicking on investor relations, then annual reports, and search for latest form 10K. From the SEC website (www.sec.gov), search for the selected company's name and then search for its latest form 10-K. Using form 10-K of your selected company, answer the following questions in an essay format.

Identify the inventory costing method the merchandising company uses. Based on the industry for the company and what you learned this week, is this the common and appropriate method used in the industry?

Determine the amount your selected merchandising company reported for inventories for the two most recent years.

Compute the dollar amount change and percentage change in inventories between the two most recent years on the financial statements.

What are the amounts reported for the company's cost of sales (or cost of goods sold) for the two most recent years?

Compute the ratio of cost of sales to net sales for the two most recent years. Interpret the ratio and discuss the implications of the changes in the ratio for the two years.

Compute inventory turnover for the two most recent years (Use cost of goods sold or cost of sales and inventories). Interpret the ratio and discuss the implications of the changes in the ratio for the two years.

Compute days in inventory. Interpret the ratio and discuss the implications of the changes in the ratio for the two years.

What conclusions can the merchandising company's management draw from these data and ratios computed above?

I would like to use walmart if possible.