Effective financial statement analysis requires an understanding of a firm's economic characteristics. The relations between various financial statement items provide evidence of many of these economic characteristics. The data file for this presents common-size condensed balance sheets and income statements for 8 firms in different industries. These common-size balance sheets and income statements express various items as a percentage of operating revenues (that is, the statement divides all amounts by operating revenues for the year). The data file also shows the ratio of cash flow from operations to capital expenditures. A dash for a particular financial statement item does not necessarily mean that the amount is zero. It merely indicates that the amount is not sufficiently large for the firm to disclose it. The 8 companies and a brief description of their activities appear below.

• Allstate Insurance: Sells property and casualty insurance, primarily on buildings and automobiles. Operating revenues include insurance premiums collected or due from customers and revenues earned from investments made with cash received from customers prior to the time that Allstate pays customers' claims. Operating expenses include amounts actually paid or expected to be paid in the future on insurance coverage outstanding during the year.
• Hewlett-Packard: Develops, manufactures, and sells computer hardware. The firm outsources many of its computer components.
• Household International: Lends money to consumers for periods ranging from several months to several years. Operating expenses represent estimated uncollectible loans.
• Lands' End: Sells apparel through catalogs, primarily through third-party credit cards.
• McDonald's: Operates fast food restaurants worldwide. A large percentage of McDonald's' restaurants are owned and operated by franchisees. McDonald's frequently owns the restaurant buildings of franchisees and leases them to franchisees under long-term leases.
• Merck: A leading research-driven pharmaceutical products and services company. Merck discovers, develops, manufactures, and markets a broad range of products (primarily ethical drugs) to improve human and animal health, directly and through its joint ventures.
• Newmont Mining: Mines for gold and other minerals. Research and development expense includes exploration costs for Newmont.
• Omnicom Group: Creates advertising copy for clients and is the largest marketing services firm in the world. Purchases advertising time and space from various media and sells it to clients. Operating revenues represent the commission or fee earned by Omnicom for advertising copy created and media time and space sold. Operating expenses include compensation paid to employees. Omnicom acquired a large number of marketing services firms in recent years.

1. Company 1 is____

2. Company 2 is___

3. Company 3 is___

4.Company 4 is___

5.Company 5 is___

6.Company 6 is___

7.Company 7 is___

8. Why did you choose those companies?