Assistant Project Manager Jim Rains was 26 years old, newly hired at a large commercial construction company, and was assigned to work on a $34 million dollar university classroom project in the southeast United States. Upon arriving on the job site, Jim was introduced to head superintendent Bob Moore who had been with the firm for 25 years. Bob was an exceptionally proficient organiser and was often requested by clients for the supervision of their construction projects. As the project began, things on the whole went smoothly. In fact, Jim was learning and taking on more project management responsibilities every day.

The winter and spring months brought many days of rain. Often, Bob would have to send several carpenters home because there was nothing at the construction site for them to do when it was raining. This did not sit well with the carpenters when they could only work 3 days per week (and were paid for 3 days’ work) because of rainouts. Other times, Bob would not send the carpenters home, but would have them sweep up the floors that were already under roof. This activity would normally take 2 hours with a crew of 4, but Bob would be forced to pay them for a full 8-hour day. Some days Bob, being one to hate inefficiency (and the potential loss of workers not returning to the site after being sent home), sent some of the carpenters (who would normally be just standing around and sweeping on rainy days) to his home to work. There the carpenters would work on interior framing, finish carpentry, and hang drywall in Bob's new addition. Bob figured that as long as the carpenters were just hanging around the site with little to do, they might as well earn their pay.

The third time Bob sent carpenters to his house on a rainy day; Jim decided to talk with Bob about the issue of billing the carpenter's hours to the job site construction cost. Bob was very noncommittal about the whole issue leaving Jim with the dilemma of confronting one of the company's best superintendents. After three more days of watching several carpenters go to Bob's house to work, Jim could no longer stomach the practice and told Bob that it was unethical to use company employees for personal work. Bob told Jim that if he did not send the carpenters home on rainy days, they would get paid for basically doing nothing. By sending the carpenters to his house to use their skills, he was keeping his workers motivated and satisfied instead of laying them off or having them do small, time-filling jobs.
Getting nowhere with the superintendent, Jim had some major decisions to make. Should he go to the project manager or someone in the home office? What would the company think about some new employee questioning the practices of a long-term employee?

Because Jim was new to the organization, he decided to talk with Bob one more time and asked that he discontinue billing employee hours to the construction project if they were in fact working on Bob's own house. Bob again refrained from doing anything, only commenting that the workers would soon be able to work a normal 5-day workweek because the rainy season was about to end. Jim still could not let the issue go.

a) What key ethical principles are potentially being compromised in this case based on your understanding of PMI’s code of ethics?
b) Are these ethical concerns adequate and valid reasons for Jim to decide to quit as the Project Manager? Provide a detailed justification.
c) If you were Jim, what actions would you take now that Bob again refrained from doing anything?
d) Is it right for Jim to seek advice from his close friends on how to deal with this problem? Justify your answer.

Calculate selling prices, using alternative approaches to costing and pricing..

and to think about the circumstances where each approach might be appropriate. This will illustrate the impact that different ways of measuring ‘cost’ can have on decision-making.

The relevant cost, however, often depends on the timescale involved. In the short term, fixed costs may be unavoidable regardless of the course of action taken, in which case only the variable costs are relevant to the decision. In the longer term the level of most costs can be adjusted (and hence become avoidable) and so, for decisions with longer-term implications, fixed costs become relevant also. A long-standing controversy in setting selling prices based on cost, is which cost figure should be used: full cost, including fixed costs (absorption costing) or variable cost (marginal costing)? The case of Peter Smith requires you to focus on these alternative approaches and their implications.

Peter Smith Banjo strings

Peter Smith produces three different types of guitar strings, which sell in packs of six strings. Monthly cost and output figures for each string type are as follows:

Table Product cost and output data

* Total fixed cost is apportioned among the three products on a ‘units basis’, that is, according to the number of units (packs of strings) of each product produced.

Currently the company uses a full cost plus approach to setting selling prices, adding a 30% profit mark-up to full cost. The Chief Executive, however, is very worried about the low level of sales and the resulting unused production capacity (the company is only operating at about 70% of capacity). It has been suggested to her by the company’s accountant that an alternative approach to pricing, based on marginal costing, be adopted. The justification provided by the accountant was that it was necessary to reduce price in order to generate more sales and any price that exceeds the variable cost would produce a positive contribution towards fixed costs which would be incurred anyway, regardless of the level of sales.

Task

Calculate the selling price per pack for each product, using, firstly, the current absorption costing approach and then, the proposed marginal costing approach. Remember that the difference between the two approaches is simply that with absorption costing a fixed cost per unit (pack) must be calculated and then the variable cost per unit added in order to arrive at a full cost figure. Once you have calculated the cost per pack, simply add the specified percentage of the cost figure as the profit mark-up. With the marginal cost approach, the logic, in this case, would be to consider any price significantly in excess of the variable cost as potentially acceptable. With the current absorption costing approach, a fixed, customary percentage is added to full cost as the profit mark-up.

If your calculations are correct, you should have noticed just how much difference the different costing approaches can make to the selling price charged to customers!

Comment on the difference in cost and price: is it significant? In what circumstances would each approach be appropriate?

Record your results, spreadsheets and comments in a simple report with the title: Comparing absorption and marginal costing. Also add any description to help me the student understand the answers you give. (idiots guide, assuming a basic knowlege of cash accounting already exists)

Bond J has a coupon rate of 5 percent. Bond K has a coupon rate of 9 percent. Both bonds have 9 years to maturity, make semiannual payments, and have a YTM of 7 percent.

If interest rates suddenly rise by 4 percent, what is the percentage price change of Bond J? -23.65% -21.67% -22.67% -23.67%

If interest rates suddenly rise by 4 percent, what is the percentage price change of Bond K? 31.98% -21.57% -19.59% -21.59%

If interest rates suddenly fall by 4 percent, what is the percentage price change of Bond J? 33.25% -33.74% 33.23% -23.69%

If interest rates suddenly fall by 4 percent, what is the percentage price change of Bond K? -21.61% 29.89% -10.25% 29.77%

Currently Delta's market capitalization is (approximately) $21.1 billion and beta is 1.3. What does this mean?

• A. The total value of Delta's stock is valued at $21.1 billion and the stock price typically changes by (approximately) a smaller percentage as the S&P 500 index.
• B. The total value of Delta's stock is valued at $21.1 billion and the stock price typically changes by (approximately) a smaller percentage as the Dow Jones Industrial Average index.
• C. The total value of Delta Air is valued at $21.1 billion and the stock price typically changes by (approximately) a larger percentage as the S&P 500 index.
• D. The total value of Delta Air is valued at $21.1 billion and the stock price typically changes by (approximately) a larger percentage as the Dow Jones Industrial Average index.
• E. None of the above.

Prepare 5 pages (max. ) brief description about Multiphase flow pumps that work at high gas volume fraction or percentage ( high GVF).

The report should address the following important points:

-Differences between multiphase flow pump (for gas and liquid mixture) and single phase flow pump (for liquid).

-Difference between multiphase (gas-liquid) flow pump at high gas percentage (say 80% and above gas) and a compressor.

-Differences in pump head, pump speed, design and stages should be addressed.

-How can we modify a single phase flow pump (liquid only) to handle gas-liquid flow

-How can we modify a gas-liquid flow pump to handle gas percentage rather than low percentage of gas

Both Bond Sam and Bond Dave have 7 percent coupons, make semiannual payments, and are priced at par value. Bond Sam has 5 years to maturity, whereas Bond Dave has 12 years to maturity. (Do not round your intermediate calculations.) Requirement 1: (a) If interest rates suddenly rise by 4 percent, what is the percentage change in the price of Bond Sam? (b) If interest rates suddenly rise by 4 percent, what is the percentage change in the price of Bond Dave? Requirement 2: (a) If rates were to suddenly fall by 4 percent instead, what would the percentage change in the price of Bond Sam be then? (b) If rates were to suddenly fall by 4 percent instead, what would the percentage change in the price of Bond Dave be then?

3. A six-month call option is the right to buy stock at $30. Currently, the stock is selling for $32 and the call is selling for $3. You are considering buying 100 shares of the stock ($3,000) or one call option ($300).

a) If the price of the stock rises to $39 within six months, what would be the profits or losses on each position? What would be the percentage gains or losses?

b) If the price of the stock declines to $25 within six months, what would be the profits or losses on each position? What would be the percentage gains or losses?

c)If the price of the stock remained stable at $32, what would be the percentage gains or losses at the expiration of the call option?

d)If you compare purchasing the stock to purchasing the call, why do the percentage gains and losses differ?

Please show work

2. The accompanying data table show the percentage of tax returns filed electronically in a city from 2000 to 2009. Complete the parts below.

Year   Percentage
2000   27
2001   29
2002   35
2003   42
2004   45
2005   49
2006   55
2007   59
2008   61
2009   67

​b) Calculate the MAD for the forecast in part a. ​(Round to two decimal places as​ needed.)

​d) Calculate the MAD for the forecast in part c (Round to two decimal places as​ needed.)