Any entrepreneur will agree that creating an enterprise is not as difficult as setting up a production that provides a constant and considerable income. To be sure that the business is developing and making a profit, they periodically carry out this concept includes a whole system of interacting elements that control all the funds of the enterprise.

An assessment of such factors as profitability, financial stability and liquidity and others is necessary for banks that determine the solvency of an enterprise in order to identify the most appropriate lending method and interest rate.

High liquidity means that the company can not only pay off the necessary obligations, but also pay off debts to third parties much faster.

In addition to liquidity, it is very important to find out the financial stability of the enterprise, which is responsible for solvency with a future perspective. The assessment of financial stability is carried out to determine the stability and financial independence of the enterprise, as well as to determine the efficiency of the capital in accordance with the originally declared economic activity.

Obviously, not a single enterprise wishing to optimize its work will refuse to carry out the above analyzes. Indeed, with their help, it is possible to review the conduct of business activities in order to maintain the value of existing assets and prevent their fall.

The need to analyze the solvency of a substitute arises constantly, since the process of relations between enterprises and credit institutions, buyers of products, suppliers of raw materials and other counterparties is continuous.

Solvency is the ability of an organization to fulfill its debt obligations to creditors in a timely manner and in full. In other words, solvency means that the organization has sufficient funds to pay for accounts payable that require immediate repayment. But at the same time, solvency must be ensured at any time, so one should distinguish between current and long-term solvency.

Current solvency is the ability of an enterprise to fulfill its obligations in the near future, and long-term solvency is the ability to pay off its long-term obligations.

In other words, an enterprise is considered solvent if its assets exceed its external liabilities.

Based on this, the following characteristics of solvency can be identified:

Cash on the current account of the organization can repay its short-term obligations;

The organization has no overdue short-term liabilities.

When conducting a solvency analysis, it is also necessary to carry out calculations to determine the liquidity of the company's assets and the liquidity of its balance sheet.

Liquidity in general is the ability of an enterprise to pay off its short-term liabilities with current assets.

In other words, liquidity is the ability to turn the assets of the enterprise and its values ​​into cash.

Liquidity can also be viewed from two perspectives:

The time required for the conversion of assets into cash;

The probability of selling an asset at a certain price.

Liquidity of assets. This indicator is characterized by the amount of time, the reverse of that required for the transformation of assets into money. In other words, the less time it takes to turn assets into money, the more liquid the assets are.

The liquidity of the balance sheet is characterized by the degree of coverage of the obligations of the enterprise by its assets, in which the term of transformation into money corresponds to the maturity of the obligations. It is achieved with equality between the obligations of the organization and its assets.

And finally, the liquidity of an enterprise is its ability to turn its assets into cash in the shortest possible time with a minimum level of financial losses.

Based on all these definitions, we can conclude that liquidity and solvency are close in content, but not the same. For example, with a sufficiently high solvency of an enterprise, the liquidity of its assets can be reduced, for example, due to the presence of receivables or excess inventory items. But, despite this, almost always the liquidity of the enterprise means its solvency.

So, the company is considered liquid if its current assets exceed short-term liabilities. From this it follows that the main absolute liquidity ratio is an indicator that reflects the amount of working capital, which means the excess of current assets over current liabilities - net defense capital (NFC > 0).

CHOK = OA-KO

where, OA - current (current) assets; KO - short-term (current) liabilities.

Net working capital is necessary to maintain the financial stability of the enterprise, since if working capital exceeds short-term liabilities, the organization not only cannot pay off its short-term liabilities, but also has funds to expand its current activities.

It should also not be forgotten that the optimal amount of net working capital depends on the characteristics of each particular company, on its size, sales volume, inventory turnover rate and receivables. The lack of net working capital indicates the inability of the company to repay its short-term obligations on time. A noticeable excess of net working capital over the optimal value indicates the illiterate use of its resources by the enterprise.

One of the aspects of the analysis of the liquidity of the balance sheet of the enterprise is to compare the funds of the asset, grouped by the degree of their liquidity and arranged in descending order of their liquidity, with the obligations of the liability, grouped by their maturity and arranged in ascending order of payment terms.

All assets of the organization are conditionally divided into 4 groups depending on the degree of their liquidity, indicated in table 1.

Table 1. Characteristics of the company's assets in terms of their liquidity.

All obligations of the enterprise according to the degree of urgency of their payment are also divided into 4 groups presented in table 2.

Table 2. Characteristics of the company's liabilities according to the degree of urgency of their obligations.

So, the company will be liquid if its current assets will exceed its short-term liabilities.

A 1 ≥ P 1 ;

A 2 ≥ P 2 ;

A 3 ≥ P 3 ;

A 4 ≤ P 4.

If at least one of the presented inequalities has a different sign compared to the option with absolute liquidity, then the balance sheet of the enterprise will not be absolutely liquid.

There is another condition for absolute liquidity - the indispensable fulfillment of the first three inequalities. If, when comparing the first three groups of assets and liabilities, there is a surplus, then this is considered positively, and if there is a shortage, then negatively. If the payment surplus is observed in the first and second groups, then we can conclude that the company is liquid at the moment, and when comparing assets and liabilities in the third group, prospective liquidity is reflected, which is a kind of forecast.

The fourth group of assets and liabilities differs from the previous groups in that when they are compared, the surplus of liquid funds is considered as a negative state.

So, a comparison of the first two groups of assets and liabilities establishes the current liquidity, that is, the solvency or insolvency of the organization during the analysis. Current liquidity is calculated as follows:

TL \u003d (A1 + A2) - (P1 + P2).

Comparison of the third group of assets and liabilities establishes prospective (long-term) liquidity, that is, the solvency or insolvency of the organization in the future, that is, the forecast is determined. Long-term liquidity is calculated as follows:

PL \u003d A3 - P3.

If three conditions are met (A 1 ≥ P 1; A 2 ≥ P 2; A 3 ≥ P 3), then in any case this will entail the fulfillment of the fourth condition (A4 ≤ P4), confirming that the organization has its own working capital and indicates the presence of a minimum condition for financial stability.

If one of the three conditions is not met, the liquidity of the company's balance sheet will be violated. If there is a shortage in one of the groups of assets, then it cannot be compensated by a surplus in another group, since less liquid assets cannot replace more liquid ones, and vice versa. Therefore, in practice there are not many absolutely liquid enterprises. In addition, the division of assets into groups is rather conditional. In various conditions, non-liquid assets may be absolutely the most liquid, and vice versa. The fulfillment of the last condition is very important, because it characterizes the amount of own funds in the turnover of the enterprise.

At the same time, non-fulfillment of the first inequality at Russian enterprises is extremely rare. But if this happens, then for the following reasons:

Russian enterprises maintain in their assets a significant share of highly liquid assets, such as money and securities, and this is irrational, since they depreciate in the first place. Accordingly, the solution to this problem is to transfer highly liquid assets to other types of assets that are less prone to inflation.

It is unprofitable for organizations to repay their accounts payable at sufficiently high inflation, since at its expense the process of indirect lending to enterprises takes place.

Based on the above reasons, we can conclude that, in principle, the above method is not entirely suitable for Russian organizations, but is more suitable for analyzing enterprises in countries with more balanced economies.

The financial condition of the enterprise and its potential to pay off current account creditors are assessed by indicators liquidity and solvency.

Liquidity analysis is important not only for an enterprise in order to assess and forecast financial activities, but also for external investors (banks). Before issuing a loan, the bank must verify the creditworthiness of the borrower. It is also important to know about the financial capabilities of your counterparty if the question arises of providing him with a commercial loan or deferred payment.

Theoretically, an enterprise can settle with its counterparties for short-term obligations using any of its assets, including by selling, for example, part of fixed assets. However, such a situation is hardly economically justified under the conditions of the normal operation of the enterprise. In this regard, the assessment of the liquidity and solvency of the enterprise is to compare only current assets and short-term liabilities.

Before considering the methodology for assessing liquidity and solvency, one should dwell on the characteristics of these concepts, since they are often identified or do not see fundamental differences between them.

Under liquidity assets understand their ability to be transformed into cash.

The degree of liquidity of assets is determined by the period of time during which this transformation can be carried out. The shorter the time it takes to turn an asset into money, the higher its liquidity. At the same time, only those that are consumed during one production cycle (year) are considered liquid assets.

The main criterion for the liquidity of an enterprise is the formal excess (in value terms) of its current assets over short-term liabilities. The greater this excess, the more favorable the financial position of the enterprise in terms of liquidity. Thus, speaking of liquidity, it is the availability of working capital in an enterprise in an amount theoretically sufficient to repay short-term obligations, regardless of the term for repaying debts.

Solvency is the availability of cash and cash equivalents sufficient for settlements on accounts payable that require immediate repayment.

The main criteria for assessing solvency are:

Availability of sufficient funds in the current account;

No overdue accounts payable.
The fundamental difference between liquidity and solvency is that liquidity indicators can characterize the financial position as quite satisfactory, however, this assessment may be erroneous in terms of solvency.

For example, in current assets, a significant share may fall on illiquid assets, i.e. assets that can be sold on the market with large financial losses, as well as overdue receivables. Formally, these assets are taken into account when assessing the liquidity of an enterprise, but their actual value is rather doubtful.

Liquidity is less dynamic compared to solvency, so over a certain period the company develops a certain structure of assets and liabilities.

The solvency of the enterprise, on the contrary, is very variable. For example, if yesterday the company was solvent, then tomorrow the situation may change significantly. The deadline for the next payments will come, and the company does not have enough funds on its current account, as the company's customers delay payments for previously delivered products, i.e. the company is growing overdue accounts receivable. Such a situation cannot be assessed as critical, if delays in the receipt of payments are of a short-term or random nature, the enterprise can quickly restore its solvency. However, less favorable options are not excluded, when the insolvency of the enterprise is of a chronic nature.

It follows that approaches to assessing the solvency of an enterprise should be different depending on the type of analysis and the length of the time period.

For example , Express analysis takes into account cash on hand and on current accounts, i.e. property that has an absolute value and is easily mobilized, unlike other types of property that have a relative value and can be converted into money after a certain period. Thus, the more funds an enterprise has in its current account, the higher its solvency in terms of current settlements and payments.

However, the fact that the company has insignificant funds in the current account does not mean at all that it is insolvent. Funds can be credited to the current account within the next few days, certain types of assets, if necessary, can be easily converted into cash. Moreover, the presence of excess funds in the current account indicates their inefficient use. The task of the financial manager is precisely to keep only the minimum necessary amount of funds on the accounts, and invest the rest, which may be required for current settlements, in quickly realizable assets.

Signs characterizing the deterioration of the liquidity and solvency of the enterprise is an increase in the immobilization of own working capital, manifested in the appearance (increase) of illiquid assets, overdue receivables, overdue bills received, etc.

Insolvency can also be judged by the presence in the enterprise of loans and loans not repaid on time, and overdue accounts payable. Although, in fairness, it should be said that such a situation does not always indicate the difficult financial situation of the enterprise. Currently, a number of firms holding a monopoly position on the market, deliberately do not comply with the terms of payment for the delivered goods, which, in the conditions of inflation, makes it possible to obtain certain benefits.

Insolvency can be random, temporary so long-term, chronic The reasons for it are insufficient provision of financial resources, an irrational structure of working capital, a decrease in the volume of sales of products, untimely receipt of payments from counterparties, etc.

Analysis of the liquidity of a liquidity enterprise (its balance sheet) can be carried out in two ways:

By comparing the funds of an asset, grouped by their degree of liquidity and arranged in descending order of liquidity, with liabilities of a liability, grouped by their maturity and arranged in ascending order of maturity;

By calculating the absolute and relative indicators of liquidity and solvency.

First way allows you to have a general idea of ​​both the current and prospective liquidity of the enterprise. It provides for the division assets depending on the their liquidity, i.e. the rate of conversion into cash into the following groups:

A1. Most liquid assets - they usually include all items of cash assets of the enterprise and short-term financial investments. This is the most mobile part of liquid funds. However, it should be noted that in the conditions of Russia, not all investments of the enterprise in securities are the most liquid.. Currently, only bank bills can be attributed to them with certainty. It is also advisable to exclude own shares bought out by shareholders from short-term financial investments.

A1 = page 250 - page 252 + page 260

A2. Quick Selling Assets - accounts receivable, payments on which are expected within 12 months (short-term accounts receivable) minus the debt of participants (founders) on contributions to the authorized capital.

A2 = page 240 - page 244

A3. Slow selling assets - items in section II of the balance sheet, including inventories, value added tax, receivables, payments on which are expected more than 12 months after the reporting date, and other current assets.

A3 = page 210 + page 220 + page 230 + page 270

A4. Difficult-to-sell assets - articles of section I of the asset balance (Non-current assets).

A4 = page 190

Liabilities balances are grouped by urgency their payment.

P 1. Most urgent obligations - These include accounts payable.

P1 = p. 620

P2. Short-term liabilities - short-term borrowings and other short-term liabilities.

P2 = p. 610 + p. 660

PZ. Medium-term and long-term liabilities - balance sheet items relating to IV and V sections of the balance sheet - long-term loans and borrowings, debts to participants for the payment of income, deferred income, reserves for future expenses and payments.

PZ = page 590 + p. 630 + p. 640 + p. 650

P4. Permanent (sustainable) liabilities - article III of the balance sheet (own capital). If the enterprise has debts of participants for contributions to the authorized capital, as well as own shares redeemed by shareholders, then they should be deducted.

P4 = p. 490 - p. 244 - p. 252

The balance is considered absolutely liquid if the following ratios are observed:

A1 ³ P1

A2 ³ P2

A3 ³ PZ

A4 £ R4

The fulfillment of the fourth inequality is mandatory when the first three are fulfilled, since A1 + A2 + A3 + A4 \u003d P 1 + P2 + PZ + P4. Therefore, it is important to compare the results of the first three groups of assets and liabilities. The fulfillment of the fourth inequality theoretically means that the enterprise has a minimum level of financial stability - it has its own working capital.

If one or more ratios of assets and liabilities do not correspond to the ideal (absolute liquidity), liquidity is insufficient. At the same time, the lack of funds in one group of assets is compensated by their excess in another group in value terms. Although it should be noted that this compensation is only of a calculated nature, since in a real payment situation, less liquid assets cannot replace more liquid ones.

Second way Comparison of liquid funds and liabilities allows you to calculate the absolute liquidity ratios:

current liquidity, which characterizes the solvency of the enterprise for the next period of time:

TL \u003d (A1 + A2) - (P 1 + P2)

prospective liquidity, which indicates the solvency of the enterprise based on a comparison of future receipts and payments:

PL \u003d A3 - P3

To analyze the liquidity of the balance sheet (solvency calendar), consider an example of an agricultural enterprise.

Table 1

Analysis of balance sheet liquidity, thousand rubles

The calculation results allow us to conclude that the liquidity of the balance sheet is quite sufficient. Comparison of the first two inequalities shows the excess of assets over liabilities, which indicates the solvency of the enterprise. Moreover, for the analyzed period, the payment deficit of the most liquid assets to cover the most urgent obligations decreases. As a result, at the end of the period, the company was able to pay 31% of its term liabilities, although the ratio of assets and liabilities in the first group is theoretically sufficient 0.2 : 1.

Conducted according to the above scheme, the analysis of the liquidity of the enterprise is approximate. More detailed is the analysis of liquidity by calculating certain absolute and relative liquidity indicators.

Of the absolute main is the indicator characterizing amount of own working capital . It characterizes that part of the company's own capital, which is the source of coverage of its current assets (ie, assets with a turnover of less than one year).

Moreover, it should be noted that the concepts of "working capital" and "own working capital" should not be confused. The first indicator characterizes the assets of the enterprise, the second - the sources of funds. Working capital can be "touched", for example, during the inventory, own working capital is an exclusively calculated indicator that characterizes the sources of funds.

If earlier, in the conditions of an administratively planned economy, the indicator of the value of own working capital was considered as a normative indicator, which was actively used in planning working capital and calculating the sources of their financing, then in modern conditions it has been transformed as an analytical one. Currently, the algorithm for calculating this indicator is as follows:

SOS = SK - VA, Where

SOS - the cost of own working capital;

SC - cost of own capital;

VA - Non-current assets.

The value of own working capital can also be calculated according to the following formula, which is often used in foreign practice:

SOS \u003d OA - ZU - SA - KO, Where

OA - current assets;

ZU - debt of participants (founders) on contributions to the authorized capital;

SA - own shares redeemed by shareholders;

KO - short-term liabilities.

The economic interpretation of the indicator of the value of own working capital is how much working capital will remain at the disposal of the enterprise after settlements for short-term obligations.

The logic behind this calculation is as follows.

Short-term debt arises as an inevitable result of economic activity. In the course of normal activity, it pays off its short-term obligations at the expense of current assets, excluding long-term accounts receivable, debt of participants (founders) for contributions to the authorized capital, as well as own shares redeemed by shareholders. The situation when the sale of fixed assets is necessary for settlements with creditors on current operations is abnormal and the enterprise in this case can be declared bankrupt. It is also logical that long-term liabilities are a source of coverage for non-current assets, since long-term loans and borrowings are taken, first of all, for the development of the material and technical base of the enterprise. Thus, a comparison of current assets (minus individual items) and short-term liabilities is one of the ways to assess the liquidity and solvency of an enterprise.

The amount of own working capital depends on both the structure of assets and the structure of sources of funds, and is of particular importance for enterprises engaged in commercial activities, in particular intermediary operations. Ceteris paribus, the growth of this indicator in dynamics is regarded as a positive trend. The main and constant source of increasing own working capital is profit.

Theoretically, and often in the practice of domestic enterprises, a situation is practically possible when the value of own working capital turns out to be negative. From the standpoint of theory, this situation is anomalous, since in this case one of the sources of coverage of non-current assets is short-term accounts payable. The financial position of the enterprise in this case is considered as critical, and immediate measures are required to correct it. Although it should be noted that in this case we are talking about balance sheet estimates, if you use market estimates, the situation may not look so hopeless.

The necessity and expediency of monitoring the availability and changes in own working capital depends on both external and internal factors: the specialization of the enterprise, the conditions of bank lending, the system used for settlements with counterparties, the level of profitability of the enterprise, etc.

The indicator of the value of own working capital is absolute. It cannot be used for spatiotemporal comparisons. There are no standards for its size. Although it is logical to assume that with the growth of the value of own working capital, the liquidity and solvency of the enterprise increase.

More detailed is the analysis of liquidity and solvency using financial ratios (relative indicators) . Such an analysis makes it possible to compare dissimilar enterprises using the normative values ​​of liquidity ratios.

It is known that current assets are quite heterogeneous in terms of their role in the circulation of funds. In this regard, an assessment of the liquidity of an enterprise can be carried out using various types of assets that differ in turnover, i.e. the time it takes to turn them into cash. In this case, different liquidity ratios are calculated depending on what types of current assets are taken into account.

The calculation of all liquidity ratios is based on a comparison of short-term (current) assets and liabilities. Current assets include those with a maturity of up to one year. Current liabilities - liabilities to creditors, the maturity of which does not exceed one year.

The defining characteristics of the financial condition of the enterprise are indicators of liquidity and solvency. But these concepts carry a different semantic load. Defining the essence of the concepts of "liquidity" and "solvency" will help us understand the differences between them.

Differences in liquidity and solvency

• Solvency is a broad indicator and depends on the level of liquidity of the enterprise. After all, if an enterprise has a large stock of highly liquid assets, then it is able to pay its obligations, indicating a high level of solvency of the enterprise.
• The liquidity of assets has several levels, while solvency fluctuates only within a certain range.
• Liquidity refers to the assets of the balance sheet, since only they can be converted into cash, and both assets and liabilities of the enterprise are used to calculate solvency.

What is liquidity

In the general sense liquidity is the ability of values ​​to easily turn into money, that is, absolutely liquid funds. Liquidity can be viewed in two ways: as the time it takes to sell an asset, and as the amount received from that sale. These aspects are closely related. Quite often, assets can be sold in a short time, but at a significant discount in price. Therefore, liquidity is the ability and speed of an enterprise to turn its assets into money to cover its liabilities as they fall due. In this regard, several types of assets are distinguished - illiquid, low-liquid, medium-liquid and highly liquid.

What is solvency

Solvency is the ability of the enterprise to pay money for its obligations that have already occurred and require immediate repayment from the funds available in bank accounts or in cash. If the solvency of the company is at a sufficiently high level, we can say that it is financially stable, that is, it has a low probability of going bankrupt.

Now you know the difference between liquidity and solvency, which will help you not to get confused when dealing with business economics.