Which financial statement is a snapshot of assets and liabilities at a point in time?

Similar to bank statements, balance sheets are a financial statement that reports a company’s assets, liabilities and owners’ equity at a particular point in time. Balance sheets help to illustrate a business’s net worth.

The balance sheet is, in essence, a financial statement that provides a snapshot into what a company owns and owes, as well as the amount that is invested by shareholders. It’s used by businesses – alongside other important financial statements such as the income statement or bank statement – to conduct fundamental analysis or calculating financial ratios.

Key takeaways from this section:

  • A balance sheet is a financial statement that reports a company’s assets, liabilities and shareholders’ equity
  • Balance sheets are one of the three main financial statements that are used to evaluate a business – alongside the income statement and the statement of cash flows.
  • The balance sheet is a snapshot into a company’s finances and illustrates a business’s net worth.
  • Balance sheets can also help business stakeholders and analysts evaluate the overall financial position of a company.

Understanding balance sheets

The balance sheet represents the state of a company’s finances at a particular moment in time. It shows what a company owns and owes and exactly how much shareholders have invested.

A typical balance sheet will detail a company’s assets (cash, inventory, property etc), liabilities (rent, wages, utilities, taxes, loans etc) and shareholders’ equity (retained earnings). The formula used is as follows:

Assets = Liabilities + Shareholders’ Equity

The balance sheet is an essential tool used by a wide variety of people within a business including executives, investors, analysts and regulators in order to understand the current financial health of a business. It is mainly used alongside the income statement and cashflow statement to allow users to get a snapshot view of the assets and liabilities of a company.

Breaking down the balance sheet

As mentioned above, the balance sheet is made up of three main aspects: assets, liabilities and shareholders equity.

Assets

Assets are split into long-term and short-term assets. Short-term assets include cash and cash equivalents, marketable securities, accounts receivable, inventory, prepaid expenses etc whilst long-term assets include fixed assets, intangible assets and long-term investments. These assets are listed from top to bottom in order of their liquidity.

Liabilities

Current liabilities may include current portion of long-term debt, bank indebtedness, interest payable, wages payable, customer prepayments, dividends payable and others, earned and unearned premiums, accounts payable etc.

Long-term liabilities can include deferred tax liability and long-term debt. It’s important to note that some liabilities are considered off the balance sheet so they will not appear.

Stakeholder Equity

This is the money attributable to a business’s owners or shareholders and is what remains after subtracting the liabilities from the assets. It is also known as net assets as it is equivalent to the total assets of a company minus liabilities.

Balance Sheet FAQs

What is a balance sheet?

A balance sheet is a financial statement that details and reports a company’s assets, liabilities and shareholder equity at a particular point in time. Balance sheets represent the state of a company’s finances and is used for various business analysis and calculations.

What is the formula used on a balance sheet?

The balance sheet adheres to the following equation – where assets on one side and liabilities plus shareholders’ equity on the other, balance out.

Assets = Liabilities + Shareholder Equity

This formula is fairly intuitive – a company has to pay for all of its assets by either borrowing money (taking on liabilities) or taking it from investors (issuing shareholder equity).

Have you thought about Invoice Finance as a cash flow solution for your business?

Invoice finance allows you to release cash quickly from your unpaid invoices.

As your lender, we can release up to 90% of your invoices within 24 hours. On payment of the invoice from your customers, we will then release the final amount minus any fees and charges. There are different types of invoice financing options available to businesses depending on the situation and the level of control they require in collecting unpaid invoices.

We are an invoice financing company who offer a solution whereby payments are collected on your behalf managed by our team of expert credit controllers so you can focus on running your business. Our Confidential Invoice Discounting solution is offered to businesses who want to maintain their own credit control processes, therefore this remains strictly confidential so your customers are unaware of our involvement.

Which financial statement is a snapshot of assets and liabilities at a point in time?

Get in touch

Contact our friendly UK advisors on our freephone

0808 250 0859

8:45 - 17:15 - Monday to Thursday &
8:45 - 16:45 - Friday

Which financial statement is a snapshot of assets and liabilities at a point in time?

The benefits of invoice finance companies such as Novuna Business cash flow

  • Boost your cash flow without having to wait up to 120 days for your customers to pay you

  • Release up to 90% of the invoice straight away, and the final 10% when the invoice is settled

  • Access funds within 24 hours from initial appointment with our revolutionary digital onboarding process

  • Benefit from our in-house credit control processes, allowing you to focus on running your business, instead of chasing clients for payment

  • 6 month trial period followed by a rolling contract

Want to understand more Cash Flow Finance terms?

Our Cash Flow Resource Hub has been set up to help SME's with cash flow finance advice, tips and resources to help with their cash flow position.

We explore ways you can begin improving your cash flow situation and start getting your business on track to positive cash flow.

Non stop excellent service!

I was helped step by step to get on board. It can be a confusing process but my rep Graham was on the case at all times.

A professional company, nice people, responsive and great to deal with.

I have worked with Novuna previously and my experience has only improved. A really professional company, nice people, responsive and great to deal with. I cannot recommend them enough.

Sales growth without being held back by cash.

Our Business Development Manager quickly got to understand our business, and was very helpful in getting the arrangement in place.

outstanding service

everyone i have dealt with have been extremely helpful

A very professional and yet friendly company to deal with.

The whole team have been keen to understand how our business works including the peculiarities of our industry and as a result, our specific needs for working capital. Subsequently, they have been supportive of our changing needs and open to suggestions to help improve our business model and profitability further.

Competent staff, slick technology. Would recommend

Halo is one of the smartest bits of tech I have seen & every team is only as good a it's people and I would like to take this time to actually specifically point out Alex Hall & Claire Davies. Alex is an account manager that has continually improved during our time working together and is a real credit to Novuna. Claire has been exceptional from start to finish; meticulous in her work and very patient with us at every temp - an absolute star. It is a shame that the email address went to a generic platform and not each individual. I totally understand why this works better for companies but it did mean that the personal element was lost meaning that starts like Claire will be harder to identify from a customer point of view.

High recommedation for Novuna Business Cashflow.

My company was in need of invoice factoring to assist with the cashflow due to the nature of debtor days with our clients. After looking at a number of options, the right decision was made to work in partnership with Novuna Business Cashflow. Right from setup through sales to customer service, the communication and support has been outstanding. Providing me with all the information I needed regarding new clients coming onto our books. The system they use is so user friendly and the drawdown payments are very efficient in the fast moving world of temporary payroll. This has allowed my company to look at positive growth knowing we are safe financial hands. I would highly recommend Novuna Business Cashflow 10/10.

Set up went well and communication was good.

Syed and Vipul were extremely helpful top class service

Very helpful from the start

Great people made this process very straightforward.

Jemma from Novuna (formally Hitachi) was brilliant. Worked with us throughout the process and succeeded when some others had failed. Carried out the necessary checks with a smile and cheery demeanour, making what would have been a laborious process quite manageable.

Teething problems -Maybe ?

It's still early days so I may alter this review at a later date. However with retentions and concentration limits and other items, were finding were not getting 85% up front, were probably getting nearer 70% Also when a customer pays the remaining allegedly 15% due to us seems not to be credited to become available. For instance a customer paid £6918 and a customer paid £1300 hence we should see an extra £1330 available (15% of both these payments). However availability seemed to go down and not up by £1330 !!! Hard to work out where this 15% has actually gone ? I'll re-submit this review when things become clearer.

I found Hitachi true to their world in every aspect of the service they promised. I can't recommend enough.

Let's talk

Please complete this form and one of our friendly advisors will call you back.

Back to top

Which financial statement is a snapshot of the assets and liabilities at one moment in time?

A balance sheet is a financial statement that reports a company's assets, liabilities, and shareholder equity. The balance sheet is one of the three core financial statements that are used to evaluate a business. It provides a snapshot of a company's finances (what it owns and owes) as of the date of publication.

Which financial statement is a snapshot at a point in time?

A balance sheet provides a snapshot of a firm's financial position at a specific point in time, while an income statement – also known as a profit and loss statement – measures performance over a period of time.

Which financial statements are snapshots?

The Balance Sheet is a "snapshot" : it represents, at a moment in time, the financial position of the business entity. It needs to be compared to other "snapshots" to provide meaningful information on changes in financial position. For that reason, the balance sheet from the preceding year is usually provided.

Which statement is a snapshot in time?

The balance sheet provides an overview of assets, liabilities, and shareholders' equity as a snapshot in time. The income statement primarily focuses on a company's revenues and expenses during a particular period.