Financial Analysis of Local Governments
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What is Financial Analysis of Local Governments?
Financial Analysis of Local Governments equips you with the skills you need to analyze local governments’ financial statements and identify risks and strengths.
With a focus on the accounting methods unique to local governments, this course teaches investors and other stakeholders how to analyze financial statements in a systematic and efficient manner. Participants learn where to find information in an audit, what individual line items in the financial statements mean, and how to calculate the key ratios.
Moody’s Investors Service’s methodology for analyzing local governments underpins the discussion throughout this one-day course, which incorporates short presentations, exercises, and case studies, and uses Moody’s medians and other publications to enrich the learning experience. This advanced course builds on Moody’s Analytics’ Introduction to Public Finance course, which is not a required prerequisite.
What skills will you gain by taking this course?
- Recognize the different financial statements and disclosure documents used by local governments and school districts
- Understand how government financial statements are presented and where to find relevant information
- Analyze income statements, balance sheets, budgets, and debt statements
- Calculate key ratios used by Moody’s analysts in their credit analyses
- Recognize signs of credit distress in financial documents
- Identify the key credit risks associated with local governments and K-12 school districts
- Apply financial statement analysis to various types of municipal bond securitizations, including intercept bonds, lease revenue bonds, sales tax bonds, and cash flow notes
Who should attend this course?
- Investors
- Analysts
- Relationship managers
- Issuers of tax-exempt securities
Professionals who are responsible for assessing the financial risks associated with local government investments or who need to strengthen their understanding and analysis of government financial statements, including:
