Supplier Finance Disclosures After the IAS 7 Amendments: Comparability and Analytical Limitations in Five European Consumer Groups

A useful reading of supplier finance disclosures keeps three things apart: how much of an arrangement a buyer discloses, how much suppliers have been paid, and the buyer's own payment terms. Part of that separation is arithmetic — the financed-to-payables ratio equals the paid share of coverage times the coverage-to-payables ratio, so substituting total coverage for paid financing mechanically inflates any exposure measure. The contribution is empirical: comparing 2024–2025 consolidated reports from five European consumer groups (Carlsberg, Haleon, Heineken, Nestlé, Unilever) shows where these identities meet disclosure practice in ways the algebra alone would not predict. In 2025 the paid share of covered liabilities ranged from 54.5% at Haleon to 85.0% at Carlsberg; scaling by trade payables flipped the Heineken–Unilever ranking; Heineken disclosed an identical 7–180-day range for arrangement and comparator payables despite an 8–11-day gap between weighted averages; and Nestlé's buckets showed roughly 53 percentage points more balances beyond 120 days inside the arrangement than outside it. A comparability check finds one company's ratio numerator and denominator not drawn from the same accounting population. The findings support a defensible, stepwise reading without claiming non-compliance, forecasting a liquidity shortfall, or generalising beyond the five cases examined.