Wesfarmers : Financial Analysis

Wesfarmers main focus is very simple but an effective objective of providing a satisfactory return to its shareholders. The beauty of this objective is that it is measurable, and they seek to achieve a return on equity, which ranks Wesfarmers in the top 20 percent of Australia’s listed companies and able to manage the portfolio of businesses which make up the group with strong financial focus (Australian Securities Exchange,2008).

The ongoing success of Wesfarmers is based on shareholder focus, financial disciplines and goodwill and hence it has achieved significant financial growth in the preceding 6 years. It is a “ diversified Australian group, provides home improvement products, building
Stakeholder analysis:

“The Board of Wesfarmers Limited is a strong advocate of good corporate governance and is committed to providing a satisfactory return to its shareholders and fulfilling its corporate governance obligations and responsibilities in the best interest of the company and its stakeholders complying with the ASX corporate Governance Council’s Corporate Governance Principles and Recommendations” (Wesfarmers, 2008).

The stakeholders include employees, customers, suppliers and other contractors, government agencies, local communities, and also shareholders in the parent company. The company strives to expand and improve its sustainability efforts into the future by enhancing the physical environment in which they operate, provide a safe working environment for employees, customers and other stakeholders, treating all stakeholders with respect, investing in the communities for development and better standards of living and most of all, behaving in a legal and ethical manner (Hill et,al. 2007, p.34 & Wesfarmers, 2008).

However there were a few discrepancies and criticism in the early 1990’s, regarding environment and longstanding pollutions issue from sites used for fertilizer production by Wesfarmers. The government and the public were concerned about leaching of heavy metals into the water