Research Paper on:
Hilton Group's Performance

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
current trends. However, it needs to be remembered ratios alone are not the only tools, trends and the circumstances of the industry as well as micro factors should also be  considered in terms of performance. The performance of this type of analysis is, but its nature historical as by the time they are produced all figures will already be out  of date. If we analyse the performance of the Hilton Group during the period 1999 - 2000 certain trends will become apparent, these are then backed up with a ratio  analysis. At first glance this company would appear to be doing well, there has been a 61% increase in revenue and a  68% increase operating income (Hilton, 2000). However, there are changes within the company and the actual performance in term of efficiency are not as good as may be expected. Increased  income doe not always mean increased profit. During 2000 there have been the sale of non core operations this will impact on performance, there were also several mile stones in  terms of operations that required heavy investment that increased both the asset base as well as debt and gearing. The net profit  margin which is often seen as a key ratio by management and investors alike, (Howells et al, 1998), is the first ratio we will use. This has reduced in 2000  to 7.88% in 2000 compared with 8.09% in 1999 and 16.79% in 1998. This may be cause for concern as it indicates there may be a loss of efficiency, however,  it may also indicate that there is a lag period between time of investment and the realisation of profit on the investment. For example in February 200 there was the