Q: 1
Jane Bowman, CFA, and Frank Shrum, CFA, are analysts for Brookstonc Advisors. Brookstone
recommends investments in United States and global markets. Bowman and Shrum are responsible
for analyzing investments and conducting cyclical analysis in developed and emerging markets.
Bowman is examining the country of Waltonia for a possible investment. Currently, the country's
economy is beginning to recover from a recession. Businesses have increasing confidence in the
economy, inflation is falling, the government is stimulating the economy, and the economy has just
started to expand. Bowman identifies this is as the recovery stage of the business cycle and states
that since inflation is falling, investors should put their money in bonds.
In terms of the business cycle, Waltonia has grown slower than its neighboring country of Bergamo,
where the economy is in the early stages of an upswing. Bergamese businesses are confident and
inventories are increasing. Bowman states that an investment in commodities or stocks would be
advised because when the economy grows, these assets will rise in price.
Shrum is examining the value of a company in the United States using the franchise value model. In
it, he will generate an intrinsic P/E ratio that can be multiplied against the firm's projected earnings
to derive a value for the company. The intrinsic P/E value consists of the tangible P/E value, which
represents the firm's static value, and a franchise P/E value which represents the firm's growth value.
The franchise P/E value then consists of the franchise factor, which incorporates the required return
on new investments, and the growth factor, which factors in the present value of the excess return
from new investments. He applies this analysis to the firm of Salisbury Materials, which has the
following characteristics:
Return on Equity 20%
Dividend Payout Ratio 40%
Required Return on Equity 16%
In light of the increased inflation in the United States due to increased commodity prices. Bowman is
examining the effect of inflation on the P/E ratio. She states that when there is not full-flow-through
of inflation, a firm in a low inflation country will have a higher P/E ratio than one in a high inflation
country. She provides the following example of inflation flow-through. If the real required return is
9%, inflation is 4%, and the inflation flow-through rate is 80%, then the P/E ratio will be 10.2.
Shrum states that when valuing an emerging market, an investor should adjust their projections for
the higher inflation risk. He states that the analyst should adjust the cash flows rather than the
discount rate for the increased risks from emerging markets, such as political risk and
macroeconomic risk. Bowman adds that there are several arguments that can be made and makes
the following statements.
Statement 1: One argument is that companies respond differently to the risk in their country. For
example, exporters would benefit from a weaker local currency but importers would be hurt by a
depreciating local currency. Adjusting the discount rate by the same amount for all companies within
a country would misstate the influence of country risk on each company.
Statement 2: Additionally, country risk is one-sided and asymmetric in that the country risk to foreign
investors is much greater than that to local investors. So if a single discount rate were used to
discount cash flows, then the valuations would be inaccurate for either the foreign investors or the
local investors.
Shrum follows up with Bowman's analysis. He states that an alternative to adjusting the cash flows is
to calculate a weighted average cost of capital for the emerging country firm and add a country risk
premium to it. This discount rate would then be applied against unadjusted cash flows to value the
emerging market firm. Regarding this analysis, he makes the following statements.
Statement 3: When estimating the percent of debt and equity in the capital structure, the market
value of the firm's debt and equity should be used, not the book value.
Statement 4: The beta will be needed to obtain the cost of equity capital in the CAPM. The beta
should be estimated for the company by regressing the company's returns against a well diversified
global index, not the local market index.
Regarding Bowman's statements on inflation flow-through and the calculated P/E ratio, are both
statements correct?
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