初级公司英语会话Lession10:利润成本分析

初级公司英语会话Lession10:利润成本分析

Listen to the dialogue between the Company president and chairman,

P: We beat our profit forecast for the quarter, so we’ve got to be pleased.
C: I agreed, although there are some areas of concern.
P: Yes, but we always thought it would be a tough quarter. $2 million profit on $59 million of revenue is a good performance.
C: That’s true. We’re all delighted that profits went up. But revenues fell for the second quarter in a row-that is what worries me.
P: But we always predicted that, which was why we reduced costs by as much as we did.
C: Yes, I see that operating costs fell from $53 million in Q3 to $46 in Q4.
P: We made the mist of saving by switching to cheaper suppliers.
C: So what accounted for the rest of the costs?
P: One-off charges, either relating to redundancy payments or strategic acquisitions.
C: And what about the profit breakdown¹ by geographic² region?
P: Asia made $1.5 million profit: the Americas mad $ 1 million in profit; and we lost $500,000 in Europe.
C: Europe is still dragging us back then.
P: Yes, but we still improved on a loss of $ 700,000 in Q3.
C: And what about our European revenues?
P: They remained flat.
C: Well if we can keep costs low we might manage to break even in Europe in the next quarter.
P: Probably. We expect to see profitability in Europe in the next three to six months.
C: Is there any more scope for cost-cutting next years?
P: We expect to make some saving on shipping³ cost, but nothing major.
C: That’s fair enough, it’s not as if we need to do anything drastic.

 

1 breakdown   

n.垮，衰竭；损坏，故障，倒塌

参考例句：

• She suffered a nervous breakdown.她患神经衰弱。
• The plane had a breakdown in the air,but it was fortunately removed by the ace pilot.飞机在空中发生了故障，但幸运的是被王牌驾驶员排除了。

2 geographic   

adj.地理学的，地理的

参考例句：

• The city's success owes much to its geographic position. 这座城市的成功很大程度上归功于它的地理位置。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Environmental problems pay no heed to these geographic lines. 环境问题并不理会这些地理界限。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法

3 shipping   

n.船运（发货，运输，乘船）

参考例句：

• We struck a bargain with an American shipping firm.我们和一家美国船运公司谈成了一笔生意。
• There's a shipping charge of ￡5 added to the price.价格之外另加五英镑运输费。