Considerações sobre a padronização do indicador "EBITDA"

Abstract

In order to conduct this study, it has been observed two facts in the companies routine and in the specific literature of Administration, Economics and Accounting areas: 1. The competition established between companies with the markets globalization, the utmost importance of speed and clarity in the interpretation of the information extracted from the Financial Statements and, consequently, the comparability of their results; 2. The concern of the accounting international agencies with the harmonization requirements on the accounting practices, consolidating, this way, the Accounting as the universal business language. According to the observed facts, it has been identified as the basic premise for this study to check whether there is effectively the possibility of performance comparison between companies from the EBITDA indicator. Focusing on this point, primarily it has been traced the accounting and economic meaning of the word Profit and, contiguously, the acts of the International Accounting standing up to the performance indicators standards. Afterwards, interested on the utilization of accounting information, it is presented a research over EBITDA, officially presented by the companies as a standard performance indicator, in order to identify whether its construction follows a pattern, providing exemption in its interpretation. The final conclusion is that this indicator, although many attempts have been made, is not homogenous and, in order to assure reliance on its analysis, it is necessary to recalculate it from the information provided by Financial Statements, the same way it is made in classical statement analysis