Features of Service Tax

Service tax is a tax levied by the government on service providers on certain service transactions, but is actually borne by the customers. It is categorized under Indirect Tax and came into existence under the Finance Act, 1994. The salient features of levy of service tax are: 1.   Scope: It is leviable on taxable services ‘provided’ or ‘to   be provided’ by   a service provider. The services ‘to be provided’ in future are taxed only if payment in its respect is received in advance. Two separate persons required   Payment to employees not covered: For   charge of service  tax, it is necessary that the service provider and service recipient should be two separate persons acting  on ‘principal to principal basis’. Services provided by an employee to his employer are not covered service tax and, therefore, salaries or allowances paid to them cannot be charged to service tax. Continue reading

Working Capital Concepts

Working Capital, being lifeblood for any enterprise, its management becomes a crucial exercise for the Financial Manager of a firm. The need of working capital is directly linked to the growth of the firm. Working Capital refers to the funds invested in the current assets of a firm such as raw materials, work-in-progress, finished goods, receivables, cash etc.   From the viewpoint of manufacturing process, working capital means that part of capital, which is required to keep the flow of production smooth and continuous. For day-to-day operations, a business needs to carry certain amount of raw material of all sorts so that commencement of production is not delayed, certain amount of work-in-process so that production operations go smoothly, certain amount of finished goods so that supply to market is not hampered by fluctuations in production, certain amount of book debts so that sales take place continuously and certain amount of Continue reading

Uses of Currency Futures – Hedging, Speculation and Arbitrage

Future contract is normally defined as a standardized agreement with an organized exchange to buy or sell some item, such as a currency or commodity at a fixed price at a certain date in the future. Some contracts for example, foreign currency futures, provide for cash delivery; others, such as Eurodollar futures, are based on some reference price and allow only for cash settlement at maturity. The purpose of futures is not to obtain delivery but to replicate without credit risk, the gains or losses that would occur from an equivalent forward contract. In principle, currency futures are similar to foreign exchange forwards in that they are contracts for delivery of certain amount of a foreign currency at some future date and at known price. But in practice, most futures contracts are terminated before maturity. The most important uses of currency futures are listed below; 1. Hedging: Presume Entity A Continue reading

The Cost of Preference Capital

The measurement of the cost of preference capital poses some conceptual difficulty. In the case of debt, there is a binding legal obligation on the firm to pay interest, and the interest constitutes the basis to calculate the cost of debt. However, in the case of preference capital, payment of dividends is not legally binding on the firm and even if the dividends are paid, it is not a charge on earnings; rather it is a distribution or appropriation of earnings to preference shareholders. One may be, therefore, tempted to conclude that the dividends on preference capital do not constitute cost. This is not true. The cost of preference capital is a function of the dividend expected by investors. Preference capital is never issued with an intention not to pay dividends. Although it is not legally binding upon the firm to pay dividends on preference capital, yet it is generally Continue reading

Case Study: Sony’s Business Strategy and It’s Failure

Sony is the combination of two word sonus and sonny. The both words sonus and sonny is a latin word. The literal meaning of sonus is sound and, sonic and sonny is little son. Easy to pronounce and read in any language, the name Sony, which has a lively ring to it, fits comfortably with the spirit of freedom and open-mindedness. Since, Sony is the combination of two word “sonus” and “sonny”, represents a very small group of young people who have the energy and passion towards unlimited creations and innovative ideas. Sony foundation was started in 1946 when Masaru Ibuka and Akio Morita worked together with a small team of obsessive and committed group of employees build “Tokyo Tsushin Kenkyujo” (Totsuko), or “Tokyo Telecommunications Research Institute” (billion dollar global conglomerate). In 1958 the company was formally adopted “Sony Corporation” as its corporate name. The main objective of the company Continue reading

Meaning of Demerger

It has been defined as a split or division. As the same suggests, it denotes a situation opposite to that of merger. Demerger or spin-off, as called in US involves splitting up of conglomerate (multi-division) of company into separate companies. This occurs in cases where dissimilar business are carried on within the same company, thus becoming unwieldy and cyclical almost resulting in a loss situation. Corporate restructuring in such situation in the form of demerger becomes inevitable. Merger of SG chemical and Dyes Ltd. with Ambalal Sarabhai enterprises Ltd. (ASE) has made ASE big conglomerate which had become unwieldy and cyclic, so demerger of ASE was done. A part from core competencies being main reason for demerging companies according to their nature of business, in some cases, restructuring in the form of demerger was undertaken for splitting up the family owned large business empires into smaller companies. The historical demerger Continue reading