Business Financing Whiz Bang Corporation

Questions: Discuss about the Business Financing Whiz Bang Corporation. Answers: Introduction Every organization survives in the dynamic world only because of three factors which are people, plant and profit. The three plays major role in the success of every organization. People consist of human resources who are employed in organization, plant consists of the movable and immovable assets of the organization and profit is the earnings made by the company. In this report, the focus is on the assets of the organization. The aim of this report is to analyze the need of replacement of an asset, to analyze the project with various capital budgeting techniques and to finalize the way through which the asset shall be financed with help of the concept of cost of capital in weighted average terms. The body of the report has been divided into three sections first one deal with the capital acquisitions, second deals with the appraisal of the project and third deals with the project financing. The report is then ended with the conclusion containing the summary of the report and finding s and interpretations thereon. In the last, the recommendation has been given phase wise. It has been followed by the proper list of references and appendices containing the calculations. Capital Acquisitions Before making any decision, the decision maker should have requisite information and explanations along with the documentary evidences so that an effective and efficient decision can be taken. Assets are regarded as back bone of every organization without which it cannot work. In any business organization, every kind of asset needs replacement after the passage of time and replacement will always bring and economic benefit to the economy. Replacement may occur due to expiration of the estimated life of an asset or due to sudden failure of an asset. In order to replace an asset, the approval shall come from the top management and that too after the proper appraisal of the information regarding the reasons for replacing the asset. In the current scenario, the equipment has been worn out and has crossed the estimated useful life. It means that though the equipment may be technically efficient but it requires so much maintenance cost and running cost that will exceed the salvage value of the equipment. Secondly, the value as of now will be equivalent to value at the completion of the estimated life after the maintenance (GFOA, 2010), (AASB, 116) Therefore, before proceeding to have replacement of the equipment, due and proper care shall be taken. The following informations are required by the management for appraising the action for replacement of an asset: Purchase cost of an asset and the value as on date as per books of accounts Present Condition of an asset Remaining Estimated useful life of an asset as at current date Reasons for replacing an asset. Estimated Maintenance Cost which is required to be incurred in case the same asset is to be kept Estimated Running cost of an asset which is required to be incurred in case the same asset is to be kept Estimated Scrap value of an asset Cost - benefit analysis of replacement decision. Estimated useful life of new asset. Cost of new asset and quotations from at least three vendors (DHPW,2012), (University of Tolado, 2002). The above informations are very necessary for replacement decision as without the availability of these no decision can be taken. There are various reasons for obtaining the information. At the first, the carrying amount as on date must be known to the decision maker along with the remaining useful life and it is then compared with the salvage value of an asset. Secondly, the cost of maintenance and running an asset must be worked out and compare the same with future cash flows to calculate present value if the current asset is retained (Sondillane M). Thirdly, the detail of new asset to be acquired is very essential. The details must be obtained from different vendors as to the cost and other technical; specifications and then proper analysis shall be made. If it is observed that the asset if continued will incur an expensive maintenance and running cost in comparison with the salvage value and the present value of future cash inflows, then its better to replace the asset. The approval will come from the top management along with the funds to purchase the asset. Project Proposal This scenario deals with the appraisal of the new project with the use of capital budgeting techniques. Capital Budgeting deals with the process of planning the expenditure which is to be incurred on the project in such a manner that the selected project out of the various available projects will be the best one which will maximize benefits for long term. This decision means the decision to be made by top management to whether to invest in a particular long term projects or not. These projects may include purchase of huge plant and machinery, purchase of turnkey project or manufacturing an item on their own instead of purchasing from outside. The finance manager of every organization is personnel who are responsible for assisting the management in making the decision for taking up the project. While evaluating the project, he uses various techniques which are known as capital budgeting techniques. It includes Payback period, Net Present Value and others. These methods are described a s follows: Payback period method: It denotes the number of years within which the organization will be able to recover the initial cost that has been incurred by it at the time of acquisition of the project. It is expressed in years and months. At the payback period, the inflows will be equal to the outflows. It means payback period method defines the time at which the organization may be able to cover the investment originally made. If there are two projects and one has to be selected, then the decision will automatically go in favor of the project which has short payback period. Its because shorter the period higher will be the long term benefits the organization will have. Net Present Value Objective of every firm is to have more wealth. Wealth comes from the net earnings and net earnings are the difference between inflows and outflows of firm relating to the project. It helps in arriving at the net earnings by discounting the future cash inflows and deducting the cash outflow from therein. If the difference comes as positive, the proposal is accepted otherwise rejected (Illes, 2012), (Juhasz L). The discounting rate is cost of capital of firm. Internal Rate of Return It is the return at which initial cost of proposal is equal to the present value of the future cash inflows. In other words, it is the rate at which the Net Present value is zero (Edward,2010). Thus, it is regarded as the cut - off rate at which the project or investment may be accepted. If it is higher than the cost of capital, then the proposal is accepted otherwise rejected (Juhasz L). In the given scenario, one project has been identified for the company which will have life of ten years and an initial cost of $60,00,000. The aforementioned three techniques have been adopted to judge the feasibility of the proposal. The calculation is given in Annexure 1. As per the calculation, Net present Value of the Project is $ 1,98,420 /- Internal rate of return is 12.80% Payback period is 9.77 years. As per the decision criteria of Net present Value, it is positive of $1,98,420 /- therefore the project may be accepted. As per the decision criteria of Internal Rate of Return, it is of 12.80 % which is more than the cost of capital of 12% and thus the project may be accepted. As per the decision criteria of payback period, that project shall be selected where the investment may be recovered at an early point of time. In the given case, the project has estimated useful life of ten years and the payback period is only 9.77 years which indicates that the project will not be able to recover its investment in its initial phase and thus on the basis of the payback period method the project may not be accepted. The aforesaid methods have their own advantages and disadvantages. Payback period Though the payback period method is very simple and easy to understand and adopt, gives the potential or prospective investors an idea of time period within which they will able to get their investment but it contains many demerits. One of the major demerits is that the method assumes the case of liquidity rather than profitability. Its because it considers the cash inflows only during the specified period and not after that. Secondly it completely ignores the concept of going concern. Thirdly, it lacks the measurement of percentage return on the investment made. Net Present Value It is considered as the best measure to evaluate the project. It has many advantages over other methods like the method considers the time value of money, it helps in selecting the best proposal out of the available proposals, assumes that the cash flows represent the shareholders wealth and it provides the figure of the net benefits arising out of the available proposals over its span of life. But it has one major disadvantage that the method does not provide the actual results where the projects under consideration have different estimated life of project (Blas 2006), (Damodran). Internal Rate of Return It is the second method which counts the time value of money and takes into account all the cash inflows and cash outflows. But on the other hand it is complex to calculate and provides the multiple rates which leads to confusion to the finance manager. Thus, as per the figures of the aforesaid three parameters, the project is feasible and it is recommended that the organization shall approve the proposal. Apart from the above financial parameters, there are some non financial parameters. These include Technological advancement, estimated useful life and estimation of the demand of the product in future which will generate out of that project. Technological advancement refers to the status of the technology of machinery or plant under proposal. It should be at the level which denotes that the organization can cope up with the changing environment and will be able to generate the economic benefits in future. If it is found after proper testing that the equipment under proposal is technologically advanced then the proposal is accepted. Secondly, useful life of an asset to be replaced with shall be estimated with due care as the asset is considered as long term benefit source and if the accurate estimation has not been made then the project may not be accepted. Lastly, the estimate of the future demand of the product shall be made with the help of marketing expert and other professionals. It is because if the demand in the future is decreased by any percentage then it will affect the whole analysis made by the finance manager using the capital budgeting techniques. Thus, in view of the above discussion, it is recommended to accept the proposal and take the project. Its necessary to look after the non financial matters also. Therefore, as per the capital budgeting techniques and other discussion, the proposal shall be accepted in full. Project Financing WACC is the companys cost in percentage terms to borrow the money from different sources of finance (Giddy). The finance may be raised by issuing equity shares, by issuing debentures, by raising loans from banks or other financial institutions, by raising loans from relatives or friends as unsecured loan and by having loans in the form of bank bills or bank overdraft being short term loan. All these sources carry cost of financing which the borrower needs to repay at periodical intervals. Some requires their payments on monthly basis; some requires it on quarterly basis, some requires it on semi annually or some on annual basis. The cost of financing carries the other component with it which is known as tax rate. Tax rate is the rate at which any corporate needs to pay the tax to the government treasury. For calculating it, after tax cost of debt is considered. Equity Cost does not carries tax rate because of the fact that the fund has been raised by issuing equity shares of the comp any to their shareholders. The formula for calculating cost of each source of finance is different whether it may be equity or any form of debenture (Pareja 2009), (Lee), (Sabesp 2011). In the given case of Whiz Bang Corporation Limited, there are three sources of finance under debt namely debentures, bank bills and bank overdraft. Calculations of Weighted Average Cost of Capital are given in Annexure II. Debenture carries a fixed annual rate of 12% and its cost works out as 9.80%, Bank bills carries yield of 10% and its cost is 7% and Bank Overdraft carries yield of 11% and its cost is 7.70%. All these sources are in the ratio or 3:2:1 respectively. The Weighted average cost of debt as calculated is 4.26% and of equity is 3.07%. Thus the total WACC as calculated sum of both is 7.33%. In the given case, it is the better method for evaluating the project. It is because, all the relevant data which includes weight of each source of finance and all items for calculation of its cost has been given for calculating the weighted average cost of capital and there are two sources debt and equity and overall cost of capital can be obtained only with the help of the weighted average cost of capital. Along with the advantages there is one major hurdle in adopting this method is that the ratio of capital structure of the company cannot be maintained as it is for the future years. In the given case the debt equity ratio has been defined 1:1 and the three components of debt is in the ration on 1:2:3. In the real world it cannot remain the same, it will change in accordance with the changing external or internal environment of the company. Second restriction is that it is difficult to obtain the present cost of capital from the market as the cost changes daily. Third major restriction is that the method assumes that the new project will have the same risk as assigned to earlier projects. Due to this most of the times company ends up with the project by accepting bad projects and rejecting the new projects. Although, the method have disadvantages, but in the given case weighted average cost of capital is accepted. Conclusion Whiz Bang Corporation Limited has undergone three phases wherein the capital acquisition has been reviewed, project proposal has been evaluated and weighted average cost of capital has been calculated. The first one has dealt with the replacement of an asset in which all the areas have been covered as to which information is required by the finance manager to go for replacement and reason thereon. In the second phase, project has been appraised by the use of Capital budgeting methods including NPV, Payback period and IRR and on the basis of results decision whether to accept the project or not has been recommended. In the third phase, financing of project has been made. In this the WACC has been found and the restrictions in using this method in the given case have been discussed. In order to conclude the report, the analysis in each of the three phases has been made in detail with proper calculations and discussions. Recommendetion In each of the three phases, different recommendations have been made. In the first phase dealing with the replacement of assets, requisite information has been mentioned so as to evaluate whether the replacement is actual in need and the amount of funds to be released for replacement. It is recommended to have more information before proceeding to release of funds. In the second phase, project has been appraised and it is recommended to accept the project as the same has positive NPV and higher IRR. In third phase, relevancy of WACC in the given case has been detailed and it is recommended that the company has adopted correct method in order to arrive at total cost of the capital. Thus, except at first phase, the recommendation has been made positive without any requirement of further details. 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