You will write a Mid-Term Paper discussing your analysis of the Zoetis, Inc. financial statements. Your written analysis should be 3 to 3.5 pages using Times New Roman 12-point font, double-spaced, with one-inch margins. You should reference your Horizontal and Vertical Analysis of the Balance Sheet and Income Statement in your Mid-Term paper, but you should not cut and paste any part of your Excel worksheets in the Mid-Term paper. (I will upload my Zoetis, Inc Excel sheet that has the horizontal and vertical analysis of their balance sheet and income statement)

Please refer to the Written Communication Rubric – MBA for grammar and writing style requirements (I will upload the rubric). This writing rubric will be used to grade your Mid-Term Paper. Your Mid-Term paper grade will be determined based on the completeness and accuracy of your written analysis, along with writing style and grammar expectations. This will be assessed using the writing rubric with analysis (80%), writing style (10%) and grammar (10%).

You will be analyzing Zoetis Inc.’s financial statements for the year ended December 31, 2017. You have already prepared the tools you need to analyze these financial statements in Week 1 and Week 2. This portion of the assignment is simply your written analysis of these tools.

In writing your analysis, you will draw upon the common-size income statement and common-size balance sheet you created in Excel. You should explain how Zoetis’ performance has improved, or gotten worse, over the period you have analyzed providing examples from your analysis and tools.

You should also compare Zoetis’ ratios to industry median/norms.

Your paper can include information management has provided in the management discussion section of the financial statements.

Your analysis should only include your own tools, and not what some other analyst has written about Zoetis, Inc. I am only interested in reading your insight not another financial analyst’s. It is always evident when a student has taken material from a professional analysts’ work, even when a cite to that work is not provided by the student.

The key for a student to receive a high score on the mid-term paper is to think critically about what you have learned about the financial status of Zoetis through your analysis, how it has improved, and what the company should focus on to improve its financial performance and balance sheet. Focus on three or four items in the Balance Sheet and the Income Statement and analyze those things. Do not try to comment on everything.

Although you may not cite any third party analyst, if you need to better understand what a particular ratio might indicate about the financial health of a company, it is acceptable to cite Investopedia in your Mid-Term Paper. For example, if you searched “Debt to Equity Ratio Investopedia” you would find part of the explanation to read as follows:

“…Similar to the debt ratio, a lower percentage means that a company is using less leverage and has a stronger equity position…Additionally, what constitutes a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ result will vary by industry…If a firm’s debt-equity ratio varies significantly from its competitors or the averages for its industry, this should raise a red flag. Companies with a ratio that is too high can be at risk for financial problems or even a default if they can’t meet their debt obligations….On the other hand, companies employing too little leverage may be earning less than their competitors as a result.”

One APA example of the citation format for this information from Investopedia is as follows:

“Debt to Equity Ratio Investopedia. Retrieved from https://www.investopedia.com. (n.d.)”

Your Mid-Term Paper must include the following sections that are clearly labeled as such:

1. Cover Page – You should use APA format.

2. Introduction – A high-level overview of the company and its business, its industry, products and profitability, and its competitors, in no more than 3 to 4 sentences and should be about half a page.

3. Analysis – You should prepare your financial statement analysis from only one perspective, either management, investor or creditor (It is your choice based on what you are most interested in analyzing). Your written analysis should be 1½ to 2 pages.

4. Industry Medians/Norms – The written analysis should also discuss a comparison of the company’s key ratios with the industry medians/norms and should be about half a page.

5. Conclusion – In this section you should provide three to four insights that would be most pertinent to the interest of your audience, i.e. either management, investors or creditors.

You should print your paper and proof read carefully before submitting. Often, reading your paper out loud will alert you to awkward sentence structure, run on sentences and grammar mistakes. Paragraphs should contain no more than three to four sentences. You should run spell check. Pay close attention to your margins and where your breaks occur between pages. Proof read! Proof read! Proof Read!

Link for Objectives of Financial Analysis: https://youtu.be/GzMxk6EnMv4

Link for Analyzing Financial Data: https://youtu.be/Ii-lXoUkXQc