In: Finance
1.a. A public company is planning to raise 3.2 million dollars by using financial instruments for a seven-month project. Assume you work as a financial advisor, which instrument you would suggest the company to issue or purchase? Is the instrument you suggest a money market instrument or capital market instrument? Explain the reason(s).
b. Discuss at least two reasons (differences) why the instrument you suggested in part (a) may trade at a different yield to a 10-year treasury bond
2.What is the yield curve of interest rate? Briefly discuss two theories that explain the shape of the yield curve.
1) a. We would go for money market instruments such as
commercial papers, certificates of deposits, etc.
Money market instruments are used to raise money for a period of
less than one year and since the project timeline is 7 months only
whereas capital market instruments have maturity of more than one
year
They are more liquid as compared to capital market instruments
whereas capital market instruments are less liquid
Since the money market instruments are liquid and are for shorter
periods (up to one year), the risk associated with it is low, and
since the risk is low therefore the financial burden is low (for
investment-grade companies) whereas capital market instruments are
perceived to be riskier
Therefore we should go for money market instruments instead of
capital market instruments
b) The money market instrument may trade at different yield
because
i) Maturity
The maturity of the money market instrument is less than 1 year
whereas the maturity of the 10-year bond is for 10 years and hence
the yield would be different. Higher the maturity more will be the
yield
ii) Riskiness
Treasury bonds are backed by the government and hence they are
perceived to be riskless assets whereas the money market instrument
is raised by the company (in our case). So, there will be some
amount of risk associated and hence will result in differential
pricing
2) In general, the yield curve of interest rate is upward
sloping i.e. longer the maturity, higher will be the yield
The 2 theories explaining this phenomenon are
a) Pure Expectation Theory
According to this theory, the market participants have different
views on inflation and interest rate for short term and long term.
If the interest rate and inflation is expected to rise then the
yield curve is normal (upward sloping) and vice versa
b) Liquidity Premium Theory
According to this theory, the investors prefer short term
investment over long term investment because of higher interest
rate risk. The short term investments are more liquid as compared
to long term investments. In order to compensate for investing in
long term investments, the longer-term yields are higher than
shorter-term.