Formulas
Understand Francis’ formula syntax to build more reliable financial models.
Overview
Like Excel and Sheets, Francis’ formulas use cell references, functions, and mathematical operators. However, Francis uses a slightly different, more human-readable syntax than the A1 notation found in other spreadsheets.
Basics
Syntax
Francis’s formulas follow the syntax "ROW_NAME"[RELATIVE_PERIOD]. For example, to reference the value of the row “Revenue” from 12 months earlier you would input the following:
There are several reasons for why we’ve implemented this syntax:
-
More readable references and syntax, with clearly stated names and relative periods
-
Syntax allows users to drag and drop components without breaking references
-
Simplified rolling forecasts, as all references are based on relative periods
Comments
Inspired by programming best practices, you can insert comments directly into your formulas to add context where it matters most. Simply place a hashtag (#) at the end of your formula, and any text that follows is highlighted in green. This makes it easier to interpret complex logic by keeping context alongside the formula itself.
Conventions
The convention in Francis is that income and balance sheet items are input as positive values (+), while expenses are input as negative values (-). This ensures compatibility with imported actuals from connected accounting systems.
Consequently, subtotals like gross profit will be calculated by taking revenue and adding direct costs using a plus (+), instead of subtracting direct costs using a minus (-). In simpler terms, gross profit would be calculated as:
Was this page helpful?