Chapter Nine
Finance: Acquiring and Using Funds to Maximize Value
Review Questions
1. What is the key goal that guides the decisions of financial managers? What challenges do financial managers face when they try to find the best sources and uses of funds to meet this goal?
The financial mangers goal is acquisition, financing, and management of assets. The challenges are investment, financing, and asset management decisions.
2. List the four basic types of financial ratios used to measure a company’s performance, give an example of each type of ratio and explain its significance.
Liquidity, Solvency, Profitability, and Efficiency are the basic types of financial ratios. The liquidity ratio is the ratio of current assets to
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If a company's variable costs are higher than its fixed costs, the company is said to be using less operating leverage.
8. Is it possible for a firm to have too much money? Explain. What role does cash equivalents play in a financial manager’s strategy to manage cash balances?
Yes because it means there can be problems in the future. They get taxed more and they don’t know what to invest the money in. They use it to show the company’s strengths and weakness. The can use it to make balance sheet, cash flow statement, and income statement.
9. Why is the $1,000 you receive today worth more than $1,000 you receive next year? What concept does this illustrate? Why is this concept particularly important when firms evaluate capital budgeting proposals?
It is worth more this year rather than next year because if you receive it this year and you decide to invest in it you will gain interest on the thousand dollars you received this year. It illustrates the concept of interest. It is important for firms because it benefits them in terms of long term investment.
10. What is the net present value (NPV) of a long-term investment project? Describe how managers use NPVs when evaluating capital budget proposals.
The NPV of an investment proposal is found by adding the present values of all of its estimated
NPV analysis uses future cash flows to estimate the value that a project could add to a firm’s shareholders. A company director or shareholders can be clearly provided the present value of a long-term project by this approach. By estimating a project’s NPV, we can see whether the project is profitable. Despite NPV analysis is only based on financial aspects and it ignore non-financial information such as brand loyalty, brand goodwill and other intangible assets, NPV analysis is still the most popular way evaluate a project by companies.
2. Net Present Value – Secondly, Peter needs to investigate the Net Present Value (NPV) of each project scenario, i.e. job type, gross margin, and # new diamonds drills purchased. The NPV will measure the variance of the present value of cash outflow (drilling equipment investment) versus the future value of cash inflows (future profits), at the benchmark hurdle rate of 20%. A positive NPV associated with the investment means that the investment should be undertaken as it exceeds the minimum rate of return. A higher NPV determines which project scenario will have the highest return on cash flow, hence determining the most profitable investment in terms of present money value.
Describe the duties of the financial manager in a business firm. Financial managers measure the firm's performance,
b. As a financial manager, my focus would be on improving the firm’s cash flow and cash return on investments by determining which units in the business are generating or depleting the firm’s cash.
2. List the four basic types of financial ratios used to measure a company’s performance, give an example of each type of ratio and explain its significance.
[S4-1 through S4-5 provide background information. Then, show S4-6 and S4-7 here.] Ratios are used by managers to help improve the firm’s performance, by lenders to help evaluate the firm’s likelihood of repaying debts, and by stockholders to help forecast future earnings and dividends. The five major categories of ratios are: liquidity, asset management, debt management, profitability, and market value.
Ratios are important in any type of business, because ratios are sued all the way across the board. many financial ratios are used for the purpose of credit analysis, to see where a company stands financially. The three types of ratios are liquidity, solvency, and profitability. Within these main ratio types there are also 8 other basic types of ratios.
Financial ratios are great indicators to find a firm’s performance and financial situation. Most of the ratios are able to be calculated through the use of financial statements provided by the firm itself. They show the relationship between two or more financial variables that can be used to analyze trends and to compare the firm’s financials with other companies to further come up with market values or discount rates, etc.
Understanding financial ratios are critical to understanding if a business is making sound financial decisions as well as helpful in identifying trends over time that can help measure the financial state of a company. Financial ratios also allow a company to run trend analysis which enables the company to see how they have been performing over time as well as allowing for short-term financial plans in order to course correct if necessary. Some of the most common financial ratios are earnings per share, liquidity ratios, debt ratios, return on assets, and return on equity ratios.
Virtually all general managers face capital-budgeting decisions in the course of their careers. Among the most common of these is the either/or choice about a capital investment. The following describes some general guidelines to orient the decision-maker in these situations.
Net Present Value (NPV) calculates the sum of discounted future cash flows and subtracting that amount with the initial investment of the project. If the NPV of a project results in a positive number, the project should be undertaken. It is the most widely used method of capital budgeting. While discount rate used in NPV is typically the organization’s WACC, higher risk projects would not be factored in into the calculation. In this case, higher discount rate should be used. An example of this is when the project to be undertaken happens to be an international project where the country risk is high. Therefore, NPV is usually used to determine if a project will add value to the company. Another disadvantage of NPV method is that it is fairly complex compared to the other methods discussed earlier.
Examine the concept of time value of money in relation to corporate managers. Propose two (2) methods in which time value of money can help corporate managers in general.
The calculation of ratios is the calculation technique for analyzing a company’s financial performance that divides or standardize one accounting measure by another economically relevant measure. Financial ratios can be used as a tool to demonstrate financial statement users for making valid comparisons of firm operating performance, over time for the same firm and between comparable companies. External investors are mostly interested in gaining insights about a firm’s profitability, asset management, liquidity, and solvency.
Financial Ratios: What They MeanIn assessing the significance of various financial data, managers often engage in ratio analysis, the process of determining and evaluating financial ratios. A financial ratio is a relationship that indicates something about a company's activities, such as the ratio between the company's current assets and current liabilities or between its accounts receivable and its annual sales. The basic source for these ratios is the company's financial statements that contain figures on assets, liabilities, profits, and losses. Ratios are only meaningful when compared with other information. Since they are often compared with industry data, ratios help managers understand their company's performance relative to that of
I have chosen this topic for my coursework because I find ratio analysis the most common way to evaluate the performance of an enterprise and its interest for investor. As in future I plan to work in a financial department, this analysis was of great interest