The chief executive officer (CEO) of Faoilean Co has just returned from a discussion at a leading university on the 'application of options to investment decisions and corporate value'. She wants to understand how some of the ideas which were discussed can be applied to decisions made at Faoilean Co. She is still a little unclear about some of the discussion on options and their application, and wants further clarification on the following:

(i) Faoilean Co is involved in the exploration and extraction of oil and gas. Recently there have been indications that there could be significant deposits of oil and gas just off the shores of Ireland. The Government of Ireland has invited companies to submit bids for the rights to commence the initial exploration of the area to assess the likelihood and amount of oil and gas deposits, with further extraction rights to follow. Faoilean Co is considering putting in a bid for the rights. The speaker leading the discussion suggested that using options as an investment assessment tool would be particularly useful to Faoilean Co in this respect.

(ii) The speaker further suggested that options were useful in determining the value of equity and default risk, and suggested that this was why companies facing severe financial distress could still have a positive equity value.

(iii) Towards the end of the discussion, the speaker suggested that changes in the values of options can be measured in terms of a number of risk factors known as the 'greeks', such as the 'vega'. The CEO is unclear why option values are affected by so many different risk factors.

Required With regard to

(ii) above, discuss how options could be useful in determining the value of equity and default risk, and why companies facing severe financial distress still have positive equity values.

You have been asked by the CEO of Gastric Anxiety Supplier (GAS) to evaluate the proposed acquisition of a new Standardized Test Templater (PowerPoint based) for the firm’s accounting area. A recently completed $100,000 marketing survey demonstrates a high demand for the product. The equipment’s basic price is $740,000 and it would cost another $220,000 to modify it for high altitude (Wasatch Mountain) use. The templater, which has a MACRS 3-year recovery period (recovery allowances of 33%, 45%, 15%, and 7% for years 1, 2, 3, and 4, respectively), would be sold after 3 years for $200,000. Use of the equipment would require a one-time increase in net working capital (spare parts inventory) of $75,000. The templater would have no effect on revenues, but it is expected to save the firm $440,000 per year in pre-tax operating costs, mainly labor. The firm’s marginal federal-plus-state tax rate is 40 percent.

What is the net operating cash flow in year 3?

You have been asked by the CEO of Gastric Anxiety Supplier (GAS) to evaluate the proposed acquisition of a new Standardized Test Templater (PowerPoint based) for the firm’s accounting area. A recently completed $100,000 marketing survey demonstrates a high demand for the product. The equipment’s basic price is $740,000 and it would cost another $220,000 to modify it for high altitude (Wasatch Mountain) use. The templater, which has a MACRS 3-year recovery period (recovery allowances of 33%, 45%, 15%, and 7% for years 1, 2, 3, and 4, respectively), would be sold after 3 years for $200,000. Use of the equipment would require a one-time increase in net working capital (spare parts inventory) of $75,000. The templater would have no effect on revenues, but it is expected to save the firm $440,000 per year in pre-tax operating costs, mainly labor. The firm’s marginal federal-plus-state tax rate is 40 percent.

What is the additional (nonoperating) cash flow in year 3?

Fatima Hopkins, the CEO of Central Adventures, is having difficulties with all three of her top management level employees. With one manager making questionable decisions, another threatening to leave, and the third likely ‘in the red’, Fatima is hoping there is a simple answer to all her difficulties. She is asking you (her accountant) for some advice on how to proceed.

Central Adventures owns and operates three amusement parks in Michigan: Funland, Waterworld, and Treetops. Central Adventures has a decentralized organizational structure, where each park is run as an investment center. Park managers meet with the CEO at least once annually to review their performance, where each park manager’s performance is measured by their park’s return on investment (ROI). The park manager then receives a bonus equal to 10% of their base salary for every ROI percentage point above the cost of capital.

Fatima’s first difficulty is with the Funland park. Funland is an outdoor theme park, with twelve roller coaster rides and several other attractions. This park has first opened 1965, and most of the rides have been in operation for 20+ years. Attendance at this park has been relatively stable over the past ten years. The park manager of Funland, Janet Lieberman, recently shared with Fatima a proposal to replace one of their older rides with a new roller coaster, a hybrid steel and wood roller coaster with a 90 degree, 200 foot drop and three inversions. The proposal indicated that the ride would cost $8,000,000 with an estimated life of 20 years. In addition, this new style of coaster would require additional maintenance and insurance, costing $125,000 each year. However, it projected that this new attraction would boost attendance, earning the park an additional $1,190,000 per year in revenues. Janet ultimately decided not to invest in this new attraction. Fatima (doing a quick mental calculation) saw that the investment had a payback period of eight years—much shorter than the life of the roller coaster—and is perplexed at Janet’s decision.

The second dilemma concerns the Waterworld park. Waterworld is an indoor water park, operating year-round. Run by park manager David Copperfield, Waterworld was built in 2016 and has increased attendance by 20% every year since. David recently sent you an email complaining that, based on the current bonus payout schedule, Janet Lieberman’s bonus last year was significantly higher than his. He points to the increasing attendance, and says that his park is being punished for having opened so recently (his park assets are much more recent than the roller coasters at Funland). He currently has an employment offer from another company at the same base pay rate, which he says he will accept if his performance is not appropriately acknowledged. Fatima needs to look at the relative performance across parks to determine how to proceed with David.

Central Treetops includes a high ropes course and has a series of ziplines that criss-cross over the Chippewa River. For many years, it was a popular venue for corporate team-building activities, so it is equipped with a main indoor facility with cafeteria and overnight guest rooms. This park has lost popularity in recent years, and has been ‘in the red’ for the past two years. If the park is not profitable this year, you will need to decide whether to close it - permanently. Included in the ‘Fixed COGS’ for Treetops is a $86,000 mortgage payment on the land and buildings for the park, which would still need to be paid by Central Adventures if the park is closed. Incidentally, you recently had a conversation with the regional head of the YMCA, who would like to open a summer camp in the central Michigan region. If you decided to close Treetops, you are fairly certain that you could lease that land to the YMCA for $250,000 annually.

A partial report of this year’s financial results for Central Adventures shows the following:

The ‘Selling and administrative costs’ are all incurred directly by each park, and are determined at the beginning of each year (that is, they do not change with the number of tickets sold). In addition to the information above, there are $2,542,920 in corporate costs, which are currently allocated evenly between the three parks. These costs are primarily due to employee benefits costs, which are billed at the corporate level. If the Treetops park is closed, the allocated corporate costs would decrease by $12,000. Central Adventures has a cost of capital of 12 percent (and Fatima uses the cost of capital as their required rate of return) and are subject to 18% income taxes.

Fatima needs to evaluate this year’s performance results before she can make any decisions. Is David’s complaint about the performance evaluation metrics valid? Is that also affecting management decisions in the form of Janet’s rejection of the proposed new rollercoaster? And is the company better off without Treetops? She sets off to the company accountant’s office to help get some answers.

Required:

Write your response in the form of a 1-2 page memo to Fatima Hopkins, from the perspective of the company accountant. Be sure to include all your financial analyses, clearly showing your calculations, to support your conclusions. Be sure to include the following points in your memo, and provide the appropriate financial analysis(es) to support your conclusions.

a. Evaluate Janet Lieberman’s (the Funland park manager) decision. Explain why it was/was not in Central Adventure’s overall best interest for Funland to reject the new rollercoaster.

B. Evaluate the validity of David Copperfield’s (the Waterworld park manager) complaint. Explain why it is (or is not valid), and what further information would be necessary.

Fatima Hopkins, the CEO of Central Adventures, is having difficulties with all three of her top management level employees. With one manager making questionable decisions, another threatening to leave, and the third likely ‘in the red’, Fatima is hoping there is a simple answer to all her difficulties, and needs some advice from her accountant on how to proceed.

Central Adventures owns and operates three amusement parks in Michigan: Central Funland, Central Waterworld, and Central Treetops. Central Adventures has a decentralized organizational structure, where each park is run as an investment center. Each park manager meets with the CEO at least once annually to review their performance, as measured by their park’s ROI. The park manager then receives a bonus equal to 10% of their base salary for every ROI percentage point above the required rate.

Central Funland is an outdoor theme park, with twelve roller coaster rides and several other attractions. This park has first opened 1965, and most of the rides have been in operation for 20+ years. Attendance at this park has been relatively stable over the past ten years. The park manager of Funland, Janet Lieberman, recently shared with Fatima a proposal to replace one of their older rides with a new roller coaster, a hybrid steel and wood rollercoaster with a 90 degree, 200 foot drop and three inversions. The proposal indicated that the ride would cost $8,000,000 with an estimated life of 20 years. In addition, this new style of coaster would require additional maintenance, costing $125,000 each year. However, it projected that this new attraction would boost attendance, earning the park an additional $1,190,000 per year in revenues. Janet ultimately decided not to invest in this new attraction.

Central Waterworld is an indoor water park, operating year-round. Run by park manager David Copperfield, Waterworld was built in 2016 and has increased attendance by 20% every year since. David recently sent you an email complaining that, based on the current bonus payout schedule, Janet Lieberman’s bonus last year was significantly higher than his. He points to the increasing attendance, and says that his park is being punished for having opened so recently (his park assets are much more recent than the roller coasters at Funland). He currently has an employment offer from another company at the same pay rate, which he says he will accept if his performance is not appropriately acknowledged.

Central Treetops includes a high ropes course and has a series of ziplines that criss-cross over the Chippewa River. For many years, it was a popular venue for corporate team-building activities, so it is equipped with a main indoor facility with cafeteria and overnight guest rooms. This park has lost popularity in recent years, and has been ‘in the red’ for the past two years. If the park is not profitable this year, you will need to decide whether to close it - permanently. Central Adventures has a $86,000 mortgage payment on the land and buildings for Treetops, which would still need to be paid if the park is closed. Incidentally, you recently had a conversation with the regional head of the YMCA, who would like to open a summer camp in the central Michigan region. If you decided to close Treetops, you are fairly certain that you could lease that land to the YMCA for $250,000 annually.

A partial report of this year’s financial results for Central Adventures shows the following:

In addition to the information above, there are $2,542,920 in corporate costs, which are currently allocated evenly between the three parks. These costs are primarily due to employee benefits costs, which are billed at the corporate level. If the Treetops park is closed, the allocated corporate costs would decrease by $12,000. Central Adventures has a required rate of return of 12 percent (set at the company’s weighted-average cost of capital) and are subject to 18% income taxes.

Fatima needs to see this year’s performance results before she can make any decisions. Is David’s complaint about the performance evaluation metrics valid? Is that also affecting management decisions in the form of Janet’s rejection of the proposed new rollercoaster? And is the company better off without Treetops? She sets off to the company accountant’s office to help get some answers.

Assume that you are the chief financial officer at Mercy General Hospital. The CEO has asked you to analyze two proposed capital investments - Project X and Project Y. Each project requires a net investment outlay of $75,000, and the cost of capital for each project is 10 percent. The projects' expected net cash flows are as follows.

Year Project X Project Y

0 (75,000) (75,000)

1 20,000 50,000

2 20,000 15,000

3 20,000 15,000

4 30,000 10,000

A) Calculate each project's net present value (NPV) and internal rate of return (IRR)

B) Which project (or projects) is financially acceptable? If you reach different conclusions regarding the financial acceptability of Project X and Project Y, explain why, given that both project return total cash flows of $90,000 over the four year.

Suppose that you are the CEO of TrinketsNThings. Your sales operations manager has been experimenting with the price of a Trinket [x], in order to see how many Trinkets customers are willing to purchase in a week [y].

She gives you the following dataset:

Price of Trinket $3 $4 $5 $6

# of Trinkets Purchased (thousands) 19 15 12 8

*Calculate Cov(Price , # Purchased)

*Calculate Sx2

*What is the linear relationship between the price and quantity demanded of Trinkets? Calculate the relevant regression coefficient, then interpret this estimate in one or two sentences. For this answer, round to the nearest tenth.

LEADERSHIP IMPLICATIONS IN COMPLEX PROJECTS: THE BOEING DREAMLINER AND CEO JIM MCNERNEY In defense of criticism of Boeing’s 787 production delays, CEO Jim McNerney explained: We are trying to come up with the strongest set of partnerships we can with the people that supply our major systems and structures. In defense, we are trying to respond to the pressures of governments buying fewer things at lower prices, with less favorable contract terms. And that pressure cannot just stop at Boeing. We have to find willing partners to share the burden. And on the commercial side, low-cost carriers and a very flattish global economy leads you to the same conclusion. So the ‘no-fly list’ is people who don’t want to play ball, who only want to hide behind the contractual language of their current programs. We’re going to give those who do want to work with us more business—or we’ll move some things in-house. This is the reality we all face. The majority of suppliers are beginning to have productive discussions with us. We have some holdouts, people who take the position that the pressure should only be absorbed by Boeing, notwithstanding the fact that 65 percent of most of our airplanes are built by suppliers…we both have to demand lots of productivity improvements to offset price pressure. Those that work with us in that way will find more volume. We are the biggest player. My message is, ‘Don’t bet against us. The Boeing Dreamliner Boeing Corporation was one of the world's largest manufacturers of commercial aircraft, ranking 27th on the Fortune 500 list in 2016. When it announced the delivery of its first 787 Dreamliner transporter to its first customer, All Nippon Airways, in September, 2011, it was almost 40 months later than originally planned, after a long series of unexpected delays. The actual development cost of the project had been estimated at about US$40 billion but came in over twice the original estimate. One year later, a malfunction was discovered in one of the aircraft's lithium batteries, which caught fire after takeoff. These problems led to months of grounding, imposed by the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration), of the entire Dreamliner fleet already in service. The Dreamliner was designed to be a revolutionary project in terms of physical characteristics, technology, management style, financing, design and engineering management, quality assurance, and assembly processes. Many of these initiatives were intentionally taken on to benefit from new developments in aviation technology and to speed up design and development; however, they posed unexpected challenges for both the company and the project team. A New Organizational Paradigm: Boeing adopted a new organizational paradigm for the development of Dreamliner and decided to outsource an unprecedented portion of the design, engineering, manufacturing, and production to a global network of 700 local and foreign suppliers. With more than 70% foreign development content, this decision turned Boeing's traditional supply chain into a development chain. Tier-1 suppliers became responsible for the detailed design and manufacturing of 11 major subassemblies, while Boeing only did system integration and final assembly. Furthermore, Boeing came up with a new risk and revenue sharing contract with its suppliers, called the “build-to-performance” model (as differentiated from the more typical “build-to-spec” or “build-to print” models). According to the model, contract suppliers bore the non-recurring R&D cost up-front, owned the intellectual property of their design, and got paid a share of the revenues from future aircraft sales. Under this model, the suppliers’ roles were dramatically changed from mere subcontractors to strategic partners who had a long-term stake in the project. This model created some risks, which caused extensive integration problems and additional delays. Finally, Boeing employed a new assembly method. Subcontractors were required to integrate their own subsystems and send their preassembled subsystems to a single final assembly site. The goal was to reduce Boeing's integration effort by leveraging subcontractors to do more work compared with previous projects. However, many of these subcontractors were not able to meet their delivery schedules due to lack of experience in subsystem design and integration, as well as insufficient guidelines and training. As a consequence, parts and assemblies, which were sent to Boeing for integration, were missing the appropriate documentation, including instructions for final assembly. Unanticipated Consequences Supply chain and design delays increased, as did Boeing’s financial losses, including penalties for late delivery of the aircraft. CEO McNerney had to face some hard facts based on earlier decisions. He acknowledged that his new paradigm may have been flawed, “We got a little bit seduced that it would all come together seamlessly and the same design rules would be applied everywhere in the world and corners wouldn’t be cut and financial realities wouldn’t hit certain folks. McNerney’s approach to workers, suppliers, and labor resources was notably off-putting, according to many in Washington State, Boeing’s corporate home. Since 2011 when Boeing opened its non-unionized South Carolina assembly plant where salaries were approximately $10/hour less than those of the unionized workers in Washington State, worker relationships have been troubled. While admirers have touted his efficiency and ability to deliver profits, alienated professionals at every level, along with union members, have described McNerney as “cold-blooded.” One labor specialist stated, “A lot of employees feel top management doesn’t value them, treats them as expendable [creating an atmosphere of] lowered trust, anger and disgruntlement. According to Richard Aboulafia, noted aerospace specialist, “Management believes if it continues to squeeze suppliers and labor, the problem[s] will be solved. Again, the track record here is not great. Most of the manufacturing world tell a very different story. Whether it’s with cars, aircraft or turbines, productivity improvements often come from the shop floor. That means convincing the people who build things to identify ways to reduce scrap, improve work flow and eliminate defects. To promote the kind of process improvements that happen in the factory, a work force needs incentives such as profit-sharing or other compensation. At the very least, machinists and engineers need to believe their work is valued. Taking away pensions at a time of record sales is simply a bad way to motivate workers to go the extra mile. Boeing right now embodies a strange combination of very good and very bad. McNerney’s management style created its own problems. He vacillated between maintaining his dispassionate, hands-off general management style with multiple-times per day meetings with executives during the Dreamliner grounding crisis. His revolving door policy for managers in charge of the 787 project (four in as many years) generated a sense of uncertainty at all levels in the company and increased pressure to meet goals quickly. This focus on urgency caused him to reflect, after having resolved the major problems in the Dreamliner, that the plane could have been completed sooner had Boeing listened more to the customer and less to innovative technology. He said, in a rare interview in 2014, “What I would like to have done is pursued 70 percent of the technology that still would have satisfied 95 percent of [customer desire]. It would have gotten to them quicker, and it would have cost us less…You get excited about these projects, and things creep into the design and you lose discipline sometimes. We just need to be reminded about that. As described by an anonymous former Boeing executive, “The sense I always got from him in meetings is that it could have been any business…If we’d been making cameras or autos or doing bond trading, it would have all been the same to him. The net effect is distancing from the people who come to work there every day, who bring their hearts and souls to it and want to make it more than a job.

Required

Explain the Project Risk Analysis and Management (PRAM) process and relate it to the case.

Note : Answers should be in word version format written and in details and in your own words

1. Read Lawrence Mishel and Jessica Schieder, “CEO Compensation Surged in 2017” and “The Undeserving Rich” in Real World Micro (chapter 8.6). What has happened to the income of the richest Americans compared to the income of the rest? Does rising inequality reflect greater productivity for CEOs and other rich people? Do Mishel and Schieder believe that rising compensation is due to rising productivity for CEOs? What evidence do they advance to support their argument? Do you agree? Why?

2. How does your response in question two bear on Okun’s argument about the benefits of inequality and the costs of redistributive programs?

Maureen McIlvoy, owner and CEO of a mail order business for wind surfing equipment and supplies, is reviewing the order filling operations at her warehouses. Her goal is 100% of orders shipped within 24 hours. In previous years, neither warehouse has achieved the goal, but the East Coast Warehouse has consistently out-performed the West Coast Warehouse. Her staff randomly selected 200 orders from the West Coast Warehouse (population 1) and 400 orders from the East Coast Warehouse (population 2), and reports that 190 of the West Coast Orders were shipped within 24 hours, and the East Coast Warehouse shipped 372 orders within 24 hours. Assuming α = 0.05, the observed z value is ___________________.

2.-

Exhibit 10-11
An insurance company selected samples of clients under 18 years of age and over 18 and recorded the number of accidents they had in the previous year. The results are shown below.

We are interested in determining if the accident proportions differ between the two age groups.

Refer to Exhibit 10-11. The test statistic is

3.-

Testing the difference in two population proportions is useful whenever the researcher is interested in comparing the proportion of one population that has certain characteristic with the proportion of the second population that has the same characteristic.

True

False