Written by Nils R. | Aug 16, 2020 7:00:00 AM
What is
a
Profit & Loss Report with Monthly Trend
? Trend-based Profit & Loss reports are considered important for analysis and are often used by CFOs and financial managers to look for upward or downward swings in the business. Key functionality in this type of report can dynamically display historical data for each month of the fiscal year up to the current period for which the user is running the report. You will find an example of this type of report below.
Purpose of
Trended Profit & Loss Reports Companies and organizations use Trended Profit & Loss Reports to get a side-by-side comparison of monthly results for the current year without having to run a single period report multiple times. When used as part of good business practices in a Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) Department, a company can improve its ability to quickly detect trends in revenues, expenses and profitability, as well as, reduce the possibility that important exceptions or shifts in the business go undetected.
Trended Profit & Loss Report
Example Here is an example of a trend-based Profit & Loss Report with months displayed across the columns. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="1744"]
Profit & Loss Report with Monthly Trend Example[/caption] You can find hundreds of additional examples
here.
Who Uses This Type of
Report
? The typical users of this type of report are: Executives and Financial Managers.
Other
Report
s Often Used in Conjunction with
Trended Profit & Loss Reports Progressive Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) Departments sometimes use several different Trended Profit & Loss Reports, along with trended balance sheets, cash flow statements and other management and control tools.
Where Does the Data for Analysis Originate From? The Actual (historical transactions) data typically comes from enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems like: Microsoft Dynamics 365 (D365) Finance, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central (D365 BC), Microsoft Dynamics AX, Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft Dynamics GP, Microsoft Dynamics SL, Sage Intacct, Sage 100, Sage 300, Sage 500, Sage X3, SAP Business One, SAP ByDesign, Acumatica, Netsuite and others. In analyses where budgets or forecasts are used, the planning data most often originates from in-house Excel spreadsheet models or from professional corporate performance management (CPM/EPM) solutions.
What Tools are Typically used for Reporting, Planning and Dashboards? Examples of business software used with the data and ERPs mentioned above are:
- Native ERP report writers and query tools
- Spreadsheets (for example Microsoft Excel)
- Corporate Performance Management (CPM) tools (for example Solver)
- Dashboards (for example Microsoft Power BI and Tableau)
Corporate Performance Management (CPM) Cloud Solutions and More Examples
