Financial Analysis of Crazy Eddie

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Crazy Eddie Financial Analysis 3/3/12 After computing the common size financial statements and financial ratios, I found many reasons why Crazy Eddie Incorporated should have been considered a high risk audit. The large size of inventory which was almost half of total assets would have made inventory a high risk area of focus. As we know Crazy Eddie’s executives grossly overstated inventories, and in order to prevent questioning they deliberately destroyed documentation that would have revealed an inventory shortage. This was a huge red flag and the auditors should have thought so as well. It may have been appropriate for the auditors to make an unannounced visit to some of Crazy Eddie’s warehouses and do inventory counts. Crazy Eddie’s inventory turnover compared to their sales particularly for the year 1987 is a cause for concern. The company’s inventory turnover is the relatively low at 3.22%, yet they reported the highest net sales of all four years which was $352,523,000. Going along with that statement, Crazy Eddie’s auditors should have asked questions as to why their merchandise inventory account dropped so significantly over these four years. Since Crazy Eddie was a retail store, the sale of inventory to customers is the largest part of their revenue, therefore that account should be extensively evaluated to rule out fraudulent activity. In a company that sells cars I would expect that goods would spend a hefty number of days in inventory, but for an electronics store I would want to know why this was happening. Total asset turnover also plummeted considerably. The asset turnover ratio is the amount of sales generated for every dollar in assets. A low asset turnover ratio suggests that Crazy Eddie was struggling to generate revenues using its assets, which is the opposite of what their financial statements report. Another issue with the

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