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An overview of the purpose and structure of UK financial statements. Covers the four main statements (balance sheet, profit and loss account, cash flow statement, and statement of changes in equity), their uses and users, and how business transactions flow through the statements.
An overview of the UK statutory reporting regime and how to use Companies House filings in legal practice. Covers the main categories of required filings — including financial accounts, confirmation statements, PSC registers, and event-driven filings — and explains what these documents reveal about a company's structure, governance, and financial position. Also addresses the practical limitations of public filings and how lawyers use them as a starting point for due diligence and verification.
An overview of UK balance sheets, including the balance sheet equation, the structure and presentation of balance sheets under UK GAAP and IFRS, and the main categories of assets, liabilities and shareholders' equity. Covers how balance sheets are used in legal practice, including M&A transactions, finance transactions, capital markets work and litigation.
An overview of UK profit and loss accounts, including their structure, key line items, and profitability measures. Covers revenue recognition, cost of sales, operating and non-operating items, different profit metrics (gross profit, operating profit, EBIT, EBITDA, and profit for the year), and how lawyers encounter P&Ls in corporate transactions, finance deals, capital markets work, and litigation.
An overview of the two main accounting frameworks used in the UK, UK GAAP and IFRS, and why the differences between them matter for corporate and commercial lawyers. Covers when each framework applies, the key regulatory bodies involved, the main technical differences that affect legal practice, and how accounting framework choices impact due diligence, transaction drafting, financial covenants, and earn-out provisions.
How to read and interpret Companies House filings to assess a company's structure, compliance, ownership, and financial health. Covers what the register can and cannot tell you, how to identify red flags in filing histories, what PSC and financial disclosures reveal, and the governance signals that warrant further investigation.
An overview of business valuation for lawyers. Covers the time value of money, key definitions of value (including market value, fair value and enterprise value), and the three main valuation approaches: income-based methods such as discounted cash flow, market-based methods such as comparables and precedent transactions, and asset-based approaches. Explains how valuation concepts come up in M&A transactions, litigation, intellectual property matters, insolvency and other legal contexts.