Insolvent; reputation; liquidity; reserves; net; suppliers; positive; working. |
Cash flow is essentially a company’s ability to earn cash. It is the amount of cash made during a specified period that a business can use for investment. (More technically, it is …(1) profit plus depreciation plus variations in …(2)). The flow of funds is cash received and payments made by a company during a specific period – except that many people also use the term cash flow to describe this! New companies generally begin with adequate funds or …(3) capital for the introductory stage during which they make contacts, find customers and build up sales and a …(4). But when sales begin to rise, companies often run out the working capital: their cash is all tied up in work-in-progress, stocks and credit to customers. It is an unfortunate fact of business life that while …(5) tend to demand quick payment, customers usually insist on extended credit, so the more you sell, the more cash you need. This provokes a typical …(6) crisis: the business does not have enough cash to pay short-term expenses. A …(7) cash flow will only reappear when sales growth slows down and the company stops “overtrading”. But companies that have not arranged sufficient credit will not get this far: they will find themselves …(8) unable to meet their liabilities.
Task 2. Match up these words to make word partnership from Task 1, then match them with the definitions below.
1. extended a. capital
2. working b. profit
3. cash c. crisis
4. net d. credit
5. liquidity e. received
i. money already paid
ii. the money and stocks of goods held by a company which are used to produce more goods and to continue trading
iii. longer than normal payment terms
iv. short of cash
v. the money made from selling goods after the deduction of all associated costs.