Understanding Your Financial Story
We started Lasterina because budget analysis felt too disconnected from real business decisions. Most financial tools give you charts and numbers, but they don't tell you why your spending patterns matter or what you should actually do about them.
Our approach focuses on making sense of your financial data in practical ways. We look at trends, sure — but more importantly, we help you understand what those trends mean for your specific situation.
How We Got Here
Back in 2019, we noticed something odd. Businesses had access to more financial data than ever before, but they weren't really using it effectively. The problem wasn't the data itself — it was that nobody could explain what it actually meant in plain terms.
The Early Days
We started small. Just three people working with local businesses in Singapore, helping them understand where their money was going. The first client was a retail operation that couldn't figure out why their margins kept shrinking despite steady sales. Turned out their seasonal spending patterns were completely out of sync with their revenue cycles.
What Changed Our Approach
One conversation shifted everything. A client asked us, "Can you just tell me what this means for my business?" Not what the data showed — what it meant. That's when we realized the real value wasn't in the analysis itself. It was in translating complex financial trends into decisions people could actually make.
Now we work with businesses across different sectors, but the core approach hasn't changed. We take your financial data, identify the patterns that matter, and help you understand what actions make sense based on what we find. Check out our technical requirements if you want to see how we handle the data side of things.
What Drives Our Work
We're not trying to revolutionize finance. We're just trying to make budget analysis useful for people who have actual businesses to run. Here's what matters to us.
Clarity Over Complexity
Financial analysis tends to get complicated fast. We deliberately keep things straightforward. If we can't explain a trend in simple terms, we probably don't understand it well enough ourselves. Your budget data should help you make decisions, not confuse you further.
Context Matters More Than Numbers
A spending increase isn't automatically bad. A cost reduction isn't automatically good. Everything depends on context — your industry, your growth stage, your specific circumstances. We spend time understanding that context before we start analyzing anything.
Practical Application
Analysis is only useful if you can act on it. We focus on identifying trends that connect to actual decisions you need to make. Not just interesting patterns, but patterns that have clear implications for how you manage your budget going forward.
The People Behind the Analysis
Dr. Alina Westbrook
Chief Financial Analyst
Alina spent fifteen years working with regional banks before she got tired of seeing financial analysis that never translated into real business decisions. She joined us to focus on making budget trends actually useful for the people dealing with them daily. Her background in behavioral economics shapes how we think about spending patterns.
Sienna Carmichael
Director of Analytics Operations
Sienna builds the frameworks we use to analyze budget data. She came from a background in operations consulting, which gave her a strong sense of what kind of analysis actually helps businesses operate better. She's obsessive about making sure our analytical methods stay grounded in practical application.
How We Approach Budget Analysis
Our Working Principles
Start with Questions, Not Data
We don't begin by pulling every available data point. We start by understanding what questions you're trying to answer. What decisions are you facing? What uncertainties are you dealing with? The analysis follows from there.
Look for Patterns That Connect to Actions
Identifying a trend is easy. Identifying a trend that suggests a specific course of action — that's harder. We focus on the latter. If a pattern doesn't connect to something you can actually do, it's just an interesting observation.
Explain the Reasoning, Not Just the Results
When we present findings, we walk through how we got there. What assumptions did we make? What data did we prioritize? What alternative interpretations did we consider? You shouldn't have to take our analysis on faith.
Adapt to Your Reporting Cycles
Budget analysis isn't one-size-fits-all. Some businesses need monthly reviews. Others benefit from quarterly deep dives. We adjust our approach based on how your budget planning actually works, not based on a standard template.
Ready to Make Sense of Your Budget Data?
If you're dealing with financial trends that don't quite add up, or if you just want a clearer picture of where your budget is heading, we can help. Our analysis focuses on practical insights you can actually use.
Why Budget Trends Matter More Than You Think
Most businesses look at their budget once when they create it, then maybe check in quarterly. But your spending patterns tell a story throughout the year — and that story changes based on what's happening in your business and your market.
Seasonal Variations Nobody Talks About
We've worked with retail businesses that panic when Q1 expenses spike, not realizing it's a normal inventory cycle. And we've worked with service businesses that don't notice their customer acquisition costs creeping up until they've wasted six months of marketing budget. The patterns are there, but you need to know what to look for.
The Downstream Effects
A small shift in one spending category often signals something bigger. When client entertainment expenses drop, it might mean your sales team is struggling to get meetings. When software subscriptions increase, it might indicate your team is working around process inefficiencies. These connections aren't obvious from a spreadsheet, but they matter.
That's where trend analysis actually earns its keep. Not in predicting the future — nobody can do that reliably. But in spotting the early indicators that something in your business is shifting, so you can respond while you still have options.
