Suppose the United States could import footwear from Thailand at the price of $20 per pair or from Mexico at $24 per pair. The domestic price of footwear in the United States is $35. Suppose prior to NAFTA, the U.S. imposed a 50% tariff on all footwear entering the country. a. Prior to NAFTA, would the United States import footwear? If yes, from which country? (3 points)

b. Suppose the US demand for footwear is given by Q = 100 – 2P. Assume US producers face a constant MC = $35. What is the welfare effect of joining the NAFTA for the US if doing so requires eliminating the tariff on Mexican made footwear? (7 points)

Federal regulators have threatened a series of stiff sanctions against Theranos, the embattled blood-testing company, including closing down its flagship laboratory and potentially barring its chief executive from owning or operating its labs for two years.

The sanctions, which have not been made final, were included in a strongly worded letter from officials from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. It is the latest blow to the credibility of Theranos and Elizabeth Holmes, its chief executive, who seemingly became a self-made billionaire by promising to upend the clinical testing industry.

The government officials proposed a series of sanctions against the company, including the revocation of the company’s certification for its California laboratory, its primary operation, and suspension of its eligibility to receive payments under the Medicare insurance program.

If the laboratory’s certification were to be revoked, Ms. Holmes and Theranos’s chief operating officer, Ramesh Balwani, would be barred from owning or operating any laboratory for at least two years, the letter said.

In its response to the agency, dated April 1, Theranos said that it had hired new leadership for the laboratory and “would be able to ensure the deficient practices will not recur” through “robust new quality systems” and “intense oversight.” It also said it had stopped running a number of tests that inspectors had expressed concerns about.

The company said it had not received notice of the regulators’ final decision. A spokeswoman for Medicare declined to comment.

Regulators, including those from Medicare as well as the Food and Drug Administration, have also raised repeated concerns about the technology. While approving one of Theranos’s tests last summer, the F.D.A. made clear it needed more evidence that the technology was ready for prime time. The Medicare letter follows an inspection the agency performed last fall that found problems at the lab.

She insisted Theranos had made changes aimed at addressing regulators’ concerns over the accuracy of its tests. “We’ve taken comprehensive corrective measures over the past several months,” she said. If Medicare chooses to impose sanctions on the company, she said, Theranos will continue to work with regulators to address its concerns.

Theranos, the creation of Ms. Holmes, epitomized the promise of Silicon Valley to transform — or disrupt, to use its own lingo — all of health care. Having dropped out of Stanford University to found the company in 2003, Ms. Holmes claimed to have created a whole new way to perform multiple tests using a few drops of blood from a finger prick, which would be less painful and less costly than conventional blood tests.

Her vision of bringing laboratory testing to the masses, including allowing customers to order tests without a doctor’s order, attracted some well-known venture capitalists. The company earned a stunning $9 billion valuation and an abundance of news media attention. Ms. Holmes graced the cover of numerous magazines, including T: The New York Times Style Magazine.

A scathing report in The Wall Street Journal last October put an end to the fairy tale and Theranos scrambled to respond to the news media’s sudden turn. The company’s fall from grace came to symbolize the overreach of Silicon Valley and the hype that surrounds unproven technology.

While Ms. Holmes has continued to defend the company in as many forums as she can, the lack of hard information about whether the technology worked has only increased the skepticism surrounding her company.

Examiners from Medicare inspected Theranos’s laboratory in Newark, Calif., last fall and found numerous deficiencies, one of which they said posed “immediate jeopardy to patient health and safety.”

That particular deficiency related to Theranos’s test for the clotting ability of blood, a measurement used to help determine the correct dose of the blood-thinning drug warfarin. Too much warfarin can cause internal bleeding while too little can leave a patient vulnerable to a stroke. The inspection report, which was recently made public by Medicare, said that all 81 results provided to patients from that test from April to September of last year were inaccurate.

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Theranos said in response to regulators that it had voided the results of those tests. Ms. Buchanan said the company, after talking to the patients and doctors involved, did not believe any patients had been harmed.

The regulators also said that the director of the laboratory was not qualified and some other personnel were inadequately trained. At the time of the inspection, the laboratory director was a local dermatologist who continued to run his medical practice while also supervising the lab.

After receiving the regulators’ findings in January, Theranos submitted a plan to correct the problems in February. But in proposing the sanctions, the new letter from the regulators says that the company’s response “does not constitute a credible allegation of compliance and acceptable evidence of correction for the deficiencies cited.”

Among other things the letter said some documents referred to in Theranos’s submission were missing. It also said the company had not provided enough information to justify its conclusions regarding whether patients were affected.

Philip D. Cotter, a consultant to laboratories, said the letter to Theranos was “definitely on the more serious end of the spectrum,’’ making it more likely that some sanctions would be imposed.

“It wouldn’t be impossible to turn this around but the response they would have had to turn in by March 28 would have had to be pretty convincing,’’ said Dr. Cotter, a principal at ResearchDx in Irvine, Calif.

Medicare suspended, revoked or limited the certifications of about 50 clinical laboratories in 2015, a small fraction of the labs it oversees.

Theranos is now doing all of its tests in a separate laboratory in Arizona, which is not being threatened with loss of its certification. However, that laboratory uses standard equipment purchased from other vendors, not Theranos’s proprietary testing technology. Also, if Ms. Holmes were to be barred from owning any laboratory, it would raise questions about whether Theranos could continue to own and operate the Arizona lab.

Question: Provide a full detailed paragraph by building a case study that discusses the causes of Theranos' downfall. Focus specifically on the secrecy and hubris surrounding the rise and fall of Theranos.

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The Wilson Company purchased $25,000 of merchandise from the Poole Wholesale Company. Wilson also paid $1,800 for freight costs to have the goods shipped to its location. Which of the following statements regarding the necessary entries for the transactions is true? Wilson uses the perpetual inventory system.

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A. Your branch has just started the day’s business and many customers are thronging to get banking services. Suddenly the computer system breaks down and the customers and staff are complaining as this problem happens frequently. What should you do?
B. Encik Bahari is a long standing customer of your branch. He applied for a housing loan recently and your head office approved the loan at an interest rate of BLR
+ 2%. Encik Bahari requests for your goodwill as the branch manager to reduce the interest rate to BLR + 1%. You are unable to do it as it is against the rules of the Institute of Banks in Malaysia and Bank Negara Malaysia. How will you explain to Encik Bahari?

A. SBE Private Limited company is applying for a working capital loan. This is the company’s first application for credit facility from your bank. SBE Private Limited company is a medium-sized company that manufactures various types of antique furniture for local as well as international markets. The company is currently facing cash flow problem due to ineffective cost control.

B. XYZ Private Limited company is applying for an additional overdraft facility from your bank. This company has a good track record with your bank. However, the company has been experiencing difficulty lately due to industry-wide recession. According to the finance manager of XYZ Private Limited company, the purpose of the additional facility is to finance the company’s overhead cost.

Part 2
TASK
Obtain the balance sheets of two Commercial banks in Malaysia from their annual reports.
Calculate the following ratios, based on the available information:
1. Capital to total deposits ratio
2. Capital to total assets ratio
3. Capital to risk weighted assets ratio
4. Capital to loans ratio
Based on the ratios, which bank has better capital adequacy? Which bank has better capital
adequacy if you also incorporate qualitative measurement into the assessment?
Various aspects that can be used as qualitative measurement are as follows:
(a) Quality of bank’s management
(b) Quality of bank’s assets
(c) Bank’s earnings history
(d) Quality of bank ownership
(e) Accommodation cost
(f) Quality of operation procedures
(g) Volatility of deposits
(h) Local market conditions

Course Name : MBA FINANCE & BANKING

Shucker’s Sea Food has three restaurants as shown below.

Management is concerned about the continued losses shown by Store A. They seek a recommendation from you, as a recent MBA graduate, as to whether or not the store should be discontinued. The special equipment used in each store has no resale value. If store A is closed, all employees will be discharged.

For discussion:

1. What is the financial advantage (disadvantage) of discontinuing Store A? The company has no alternative use for the restaurant facility.

2. How might the statements be restructured to provide a more informative management report for analysis purposes.

For your main Discussion post, list at least one of each transaction related to all of the following business events:

1. Purchase of goods or services for cash
2. Providing services for cash
3. Providing services on account
4. Purchase of goods or services on account
5. Payment of a previously recorded expense
6. Receipt of a previously recorded revenue earned

Be sure to explain your logic in the analysis of your business transactions and do not repeat examples from the textbook. Also, list the type of source documents that may serve as evidence for each accounting transaction. Here is an example of a purchase of goods for cash:

My Company purchased $1,000 of supplies during the current accounting period; payment was made at the time of purchase. The source I would need is a sales receipt from the company from which I purchased the supplies.

Additionally, for each business transaction presented, answer these questions:

1. Which accounts are affected for each transaction?
2. How is each account affected (debit or credit, increase or decrease), specifically?

10. You recently joined an AI (artificial intelligence) spin-out that has been launched by PhD students of the University of Oxford. The company has developed a range of proprietary algorithms that allow it to locate the source of malaria outbreaks, and predict the pace of the spread and the duration of the outbreak. The project has received public funding in the form of a research grant, but the funds may run out before the product is market ready. A new research grant application would delay the launch for 12 months but it is highly likely that the grant application will be successful. After the company has received some press coverage an off-shore based venture capital firm offers a much needed immediate cash injection in exchange for shares of the company.

a) You are tasked to make the final decision on whether to accept or reject the offer from the venture capital firm. Discuss how you reached your decision.

b) Discuss the short-term and long-term implications of your decision on the common good in the UK and globally.

Please read and answer the questions.

ESPN is a global cable television network and media company with headquarters in Bristol, Connecticut. Founded in 1979, ESPN grew along with the cable television industry to become a mainstay of American popular culture. After a series of investments by Hearst Publications and ABC (the American Broadcasting Network), 80% of ESPN finally ended up in the hands of entertainment giant The Walt Disney Company, and 20% with the Hearst Corporation, a 100-year-old media company based largely on newspaper and magazine businesses. ESPN focuses on sports programming including live and pre-taped event telecasts, sports talk shows, and other original programming. While originally a cable television network, ESPN has since expanded aggressively to the Internet as well as radio and print magazines.ESPN is actually a family of sports networks and individual shows. There are eight 24-hourdomestic television sports networks: ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNEWS, ESPN Classic, ESPN Deportes (a Spanish language network), ESPNU (a network devoted to college sports), and the regionally focused Longhorn Network (a network dedicated to The University of Texas athletics) and SEC Network (focused on Southeastern Athletic Conference sports). ESPN also operates five high-definition television simulcast services: ESPN HD, ESPN2 HD, ESPNEWS HD, ESPNU HD, and ESPN Deportes HD. ESPN programs the sports schedule on the ABC Television Network, which is branded ESPN on ABC. ESPN International has ownership interests in 24 television networks that reach households in 61 countries and territories across seven continents. In addition to its media outlets, ESPN is well-known for its ownership of the rights to various professional and college sports programming.On the Internet, ESPN owns ESPN.com, which delivers comprehensive sports programming news, information, and video. ESPN3 is a broadband service that delivers thousandsof live events. Other sites include WatchESPN, ESPNRadio, ESPNDeportes, ESPNFC, ESPNCricinfo, ESPNScrum, ESPNFL, and a variety of market-specific sites. ESPN also owns the statisticallyfocused political and sports site FiveThirtyEight.In 2016, ESPN digital properties averaged approximately 80 million U.S. users per month who watched 7.0 billion minutes of content. In terms of reach, ESPN lead the Sports category, generating over 15% of all Sports category usage for the year and 55% more than its closest competitor. ESPN is also the industry leader in terms of unique visitors to, and minutes watched on, its mobile Web site and mobile apps, boasting the top two sports apps in its flagship ESPN app and WatchESPN digital streaming app.ESPN has also had to change core programming elements such as SportsCenter to fit the new digitally-dominated landscape. ESPN’s new SportsCenter set has 114 monitors compared to the older one’s 15, nearly 10,000 square feet of space, 1,100 miles of fiber optic cable, and the ability to accommodate emerging technologies that may arise. Thetrouble for ESPN is that even the most cutting-edge TV studio may not be enough to draw viewers, and the most comprehensive network of national and regional sports networks may no longer be ESPN’s greatest strength. More users are accessing ESPN content via mobile devices at the expense of TV, and services that allow users to avoid traditional cable packages that contain ESPN are proliferating. Typical sports fans are now interested in fantasy football and getting their sports news the instant it happens, not hours later. Still, ESPN has committed itself to embracing change, and maintains a dominant presence on mobile. Its media personalities are all extremely active on Twitter. If users should become interested in 3D technology, virtual reality, or something totally unforeseen, ESPN hopes that it’s taken the necessary steps to be at the cutting edge for years to come.

1.How has ESPN handled the rise of Twitter? How has it incorporated Twitter into SportsCenter?

2.What has ESPN, originally a cable-only service, done to adjust to the rise in users canceling their cable subscriptions in favor of unbundling services?

3.What is the most important show on ESPN? What has ESPN done to upgrade it?3

Financial Reporting: Do Small Errors Need to be Reported?

Ben is a recent Santa Clara University graduate who has just started his first job in the finance department of a publicly traded Silicon Valley company. One of his main responsibilities is to create and distribute extensive Microsoft Excel reports that analyze costs and revenues for different divisions. Ben sends completed reports to his direct supervisor and the CFO. The CFO then uses the information to create the company's financial reports, in addition to the strategy and forecasting formulation.

While Ben considers himself to be detailed-oriented, the complicated nature of and the sheer volume of data sometimes overwhelm him, which is exacerbated by their strict deadlines. While Ben works hard to prepare the reports as accurately as possible, he often finds errors after he has submitted his final report. When the errors are critical, he revises the reports and resends them. However, some of the errors are minor, in Ben's estimation, and he doubts that the CFO will use or look at these figures. Ben is ambitious and wants to be promoted, but worries that if he frequently sends out revised reports he will appear unreliable and unqualified. At the same time, the potential consequences from inaccurate financial reports put the company, the CFO and CEO, and Ben himself at risk.

Think about... What actions should Ben take when he catches a mistake? Is he obligated to report every error, particularly since he works for a publicly traded company? Is there such a thing as a small error in this context?

For your post, put yourself in Ben's shoes... You have a family at home that you provide for. What would you do if you caught one of your own errors? Does the amount of the error matter? Are you willing to get fired? How important is trust? How much do you value integrity?

Tshepo and Onalenna are two graduates who were employed by a big company in Pikwe. after gaining some experience, they gace in to the temptation to go it alone. They approached a company consultant in town who advised that they could open their own company with the two as directors sharing 50:50. Their first major business was through a tender for construction of an oil pipeline from Maun to Franscis town. This tender was valued at P50 million. After receiving their first payment, they all over suddenly become spent thrift. They settled for expensive procurement of cars, houses; which they billed on the company. As a consequence taxes bagan to fall due and government pressed them to account for the monies they had received. Fearing they might be prosecuted, they withdraw all the money and migrate to South Africa. The company has been betrayed and so are the employees and the government.

required :

In relation to company law, explain the doctrine of separate legal personality and illustrate the effect of the doctrine on the liability of owners of the company