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Business has become more international and more complex. Whether you are a manager, a student, or someone generally interested in corporate financial information, you want information and you want to understand that information. Companies in all countries are required to generate financial information, if for no other reason than to settle their tax obligations. If you are interested in the larger companies, such as those listed on a stock exchange, they must make financial information public, and the nature and type of that information is strictly regulated. Companies must comply with accounting standards. Many countries use the International Accounting Standards issued by the IFRS Foundation. This is a not-for-profit international organization that has developed a single set of high-quality global accounting standards. These standards can be complex, but this book explains clearly the main requirements.

This book bridges the gap between the accounting and the actuarial sides of Indian life insurance companies, by exploring the relationships between the embedded value calculated by actuaries and the revenue account and balance sheet prepared by the accountants. The author provides publicly available sources of information to place a value on the shares of Indian life insurance companies from an outsider's point of view. Life insurance company accounts are complex and require knowledge of specific concepts in order to analyze and appreciate them. This book will help a layperson with reasonable numerical abilities understand the calculation of the share price of a life insurance company. In particular, it will help analysts and accountants with no actuarial background understand the concepts of embedded and appraisal value. Cash flow statements of these companies are often ignored and delegated to the background or usually to a single page in their annual reports. This book examines the cash flows in detail and rearranges them to get a better picture of the financial health of the underlying companies. It also explains the relationship between the different measures of profit such as cash reserves, surplus, profit after tax, and embedded value. Often this information is only available internally or to consultants. The author uses alternative approaches based purely on public disclosures by these companies, thereby enabling professionals without access to internal information to come to informed judgments about the actual performance of the companies.