Financial Statements : A Step-by-Step Guide to Understanding and Creating Financial Reports Book

I have read this book because I am in a process of educating myself about the current financial system governing this world. The outcome of this education process might directly or indirectly benefit me in my career or in my life decisions.
Life has become very complex. To guarantee a chance of having a decent life in this complexity it has become required to understand the complex tools that is embedded in this complex system. Similarly to modern computers, what we experience in this life is the front end but what governs life is the back end. In my honest opinion, understanding the financial system and how it operates would allow me to understand a portion of life complexity.

I have read two books about accounting and finance, this book has been the best and the most comprehensive so far. It explains the concepts and the elements constituting financial statements and then provides detailed scenarios on how these elements are interrelated. The detailed scenarios of the book comprehensively covers many stages an enterprise would go through from establishment to expansion and going to public, things I have not seen mentioned in the popular accounting and finance books I previously read. The comprehensiveness of the book would make it a very good reference for non-financial and non-accountant, it is a non-one-time-read book. Some of the topics covered in this book includes, but not restricted to:

* Costs vs expenses
* Risk and Uncertainty of Investments (e.g. the risks and uncertainties of expanding the business of a successful applesauce factor.)
* Discounted cash flow analysis and investment rate of return.
* Weighted Average Cost of Capital (aka WACC) and risk premiums.
* Fixed costing and variable costing.
* Standard costs, actual costs, and the costing variances.
* Volume based break-even analysis.
* Profitability and financial ratios.
* Creative accounting.
* Venture capital and leverage.
* Par value, diluted earnings and basic earnings.

The only thing I regret about this book is reading it on Kindle.
I highly recommend the book to non-finance and non-accountants interested to know about accounting and finance, investors, and the individuals interested in understanding the surplus value generated by the capitalist mode of production.