Economic Value Added Versus Cash Value Added: The Case of Companies in Transitional Economy, Poland

Abstrak

This paper examines the application of the increasingly popular economic value added (EVA) and cash value added (CVA) measures of financial performance of private and publicly-traded firms. EVA and CVA are measured for a sample of Polish firms. Since traditional accounting measures are not robust indicators of corporate performance of firms in transitional economies, these alternate measures provide better assessment of value/cash flow creation and solvency. The results suggest that Polish firms, though reportedly making accounting profits, are indeed unable to generate value to shareholders. Further, the cash flow measures indicate a great deal of solvency risk. Thus, we recommend the use of these EVA and CVA measures for evaluating performance of companies, especially, in transitional economies.