辅导 ACCFIN1003_1G Finance 1辅导 C/C++语言

Assessment Brief 2023/24

Please make sure you carefully read and understand the question or task. If you have

unanswered questions, please post these on the course Moodle Discussion Forum, and we’ll respond.

Assignment Information

1. Question

This assignment will give you an opportunity to develop an understanding on how

companies operate, their governance structure, their interaction with financial

markets, their capital structure and how to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of a company. The underlying idea is to form. a view about the company by applying the concepts learned in the course. In each unit you will be given some activities to do

which are linked with the topic covered in the lecture. The assignment has to be done in a group. As a group, you are expected to work together, engage in critical

discussion and analysis and write a joint report about the company. In line with the

programme intended learning outcomes, the main reason for the assignment to be

done in groups is to stimulate discussion on various topics, to help develop the ability to work in teams and to jointly construct and sustain reasoned and coherent

arguments. The graduate attributes and transferable skills that are expected to

develop through actively participating and working on this assignment will be lifelong learning.

ACTIVITY 1 (Unit 1) Group formation and Company Selection

• You should form. a group of 4 to work with.

• Sign up for groups on Moodle.

• Each group should select one company.

• It should be a public company.

• It should have a trading history of at least three years.

• You should also obtain three years of financial statements.

• Ensure the company has bonds outstanding and they are listed on some major stock market.

• The company should be followed by analysts.

It can be any company from any country, but I would suggest selecting British or American companies (easier data availability)

Avoid!!!

• Financial and utility companies (and even real estate investment trusts, mutual funds etc)

• Companies which no longer exist or money losing companies

• Companies with very complex structures i.e., conglomerates

ACTIVITY 2 (Unit 1) Objective and Corporate Governance of your Company

Think of yourself as a group of investment officers, working on a project to investigate

about a selected company that your bank might consider investing in. Your immediate

manager requires you to produce a report about the various aspects of the company.

In some units or sub-units, you will be given some questions to answer and by the end of the course, you will be required to present a detailed report about the company based on those questions.

Note: all activities carry same weight. You have already selected a company in the previous activity. In this activity you are required to examine the background of the company and understand the corporate governance in relation to the various

stakeholders of the company.

Questions

• What is the objective of your company? How do they state it? What do they emphasize   upon the most? When looking at the annual report and other sources about the firm, such as their website or analysing other communication from the firm, do they mention their

objective(s) and how they plan to achieve it? Do they talk about Shareholders’ wealth maximisation or how they value shareholders?

• Identify any major incident in the past three years that resulted in significant share price change of this company.

• Who are the CEO and other top managers of the company? Find out how much they are paid and in which form. Do they have performance related rewards? Has the company

ever used such schemes? What are these rewards related to i.e., performance of the

firm, share price or something else?

• Look at the company’s board of directors. How many independent non-executive and

executive directors are there? How long have they been associated with the company?    Are these directors associated with other companies too? If so, in what capacity? Do you think this can have any impact on how they perform. their role in your company?

• Does any director, CEO or any other member of the top management have shareholding in this company?

• Do you see any potential conflicts of interest between various stakeholders of the company? If so, how responsive is management to those stakeholders?

• How socially responsible your firm is? Do they have a good reputation being socially

responsible? Do they often invest in social projects? Do they emphasise upon this often? Have they ever been criticised for their contribution to the society and how they have

dealt with it? Are there any scandals, the firm has ever faced?

ACTIVITY 3 (Unit 1) Financial Statement Analysis

Identify the main financial statements in the annual reports of your firm.

• Read the Chairman’s and Director’s report and review. Do they tell you something interesting about the firm, its projects and strategies?

• Analyse the financial statement for the past three years by discussing the following set  of ratios only (see lecture slides) and compare them with at least 2- 3 competitors in that industry :

• – Liquidity ratios

• – Assets Management Ratios

• – Debt management ratios

• – Profitability ratios

• – Market value ratios

• Provide a common size and a horizontal/percentage change analysis only for major components (as in the lecture slides).

If there are some interesting findings, do you have any recommendations for the company? NOTE:

• I would suggest to you to present ratio, common size and horizontal analysis in the

appendix and only discuss interesting findings of the analysis instead of discussing each and everything separately. It is important that you have a good balance across all

activities.

• Though it would be good if you could understand specific items in the statements (like hedging reserves), I would like you to focus on main items of importance i.e., total debt, equity, long-term debt, assets etc such as those presented in the lecture notes.

ACTIVITY 4 (Unit 2) Debt Financing

• Has the company raised funds through Money market? If so what instruments have they used?

• Has your company invested in money market securities also? If so in what instruments?

• Where and how does the firm get its current financing?

• How (if at all) does the firm borrow money?

• Does it use bank loans or corporate bonds? • What is the maturity structure for the debt?

• What type of debt does the firm have: current, fixed or floating?

• If the firm has issued bonds, are there various types of bonds it has issued?

• Are the bonds of the company listed on any major stock exchange?

• What is the par value of these bonds and what is the average price of these bonds?

• Is the company planning to issue more debt in the future?

• Would these financing choices be classified as debt, equity, or hybrid securities? What are the proportions of each?

Activity 5 (Unit 2) Equity Financing

• What is the debt to equity ratio of your company?

• How many outstanding shares your company has?

• What is the total book value of equity of your company?

• What is the market capitalization of your company?

• What is the PE ratio for your company; how do you interpret this ratio in the context of your company?

• What is the Net Asset Value (NAV) of your company? Compare the PE and NAV of your company with two other competitors.

• Has your company also issued preference shares? If so at what rate of dividend? Cumulative, redeemable and/or participating?

• What is the par or face value of your company’s share?

• What is the current share price of your company’s share?

• Has the stock price significantly changed in the past few years?

• If so, can you find out why? Are there any major investment? Good or bad news?

• How much has the firm paid out in dividends each year for the past few years?

• What is the dividend growth rate over the past three years?

• How many shares have been bought back each year for the past few years? What is the reason for buying back the share?

ACTIVITY 6 (Unit 3) Investment Activities

• What type of investments (in long-term assets) has your firm made in the past few years.

• Are there any significant projects which have had a positive effect on its market price or profitability?

• Can you identify any market price reaction following an announcement of major project?

• Does your firm make few long-term investments each year, or several?

• Is there any pattern in the types of investments? i.e., more acquisition or projects involving corporate social image?

• Are there any particular trends in investments you can identify over the years that have worked for the company?

• What do you think these projects are mainly undertaken for? Corporate image, market price maximisation, market share or something else?

• What are the main strengths of your firms and differential advantages of your firm, specifically in term of its assets structure and long-term investment policies?

• Who are the primary competitors of this firm, and how does the firm compare to them in terms of both quantitative (size, profitability, risk) and qualitative measures (quality of management, service)? Are the firm’s competitors catching up with the

2.ADDITIONAL INFORMATION FOR GROUP ASSIGNMENTS

This assessment is group-based.

The aim of this exercise is to allow you to:

•    Enhance teamworking skills

•    Enhance learning and collaborative skills

•    Enhance planning and time management skills

•    Demonstrate an understanding of the factors involved in making corporate financial decisions.

Arrangements for forming groups and allocating roles

The arrangements for forming groups and allocating roles are as follows:

•    Students will choose their group. Groups will be formed via a Moodle group signup

page. Signup will be available from Monday 15 January to Monday 22 January 2024.

•    There should be 4 (four) students per group.

•    Students within each group will negotiate their allocated individual roles.

Groups must discuss the Business School's Assessed Groupwork Policy and agree how   they will apply it at their first meeting. Students will be provided with information regarding the groupwork policy.

Moodle forum

Group members must use the group forum provided to interact to ensure that no student is disadvantaged by not having a particular social media account.

Peer evaluation

When your group has concluded the assignment, each member of the group should

complete a separate copy of the peer and self-assessment form. Your grade will be strictly

based on your contribution to the group assignment as assessed by your group members.

Your assignment will not be marked if all members have not submitted this form. Note that

this is a confidential report and you do not need to discuss it with your group members. Once completed, you need to upload the form. on the link provided by 12 noon on 22nd March

2024. This must NOT be uploaded along with your assignment to Moodle and should NOT be put through Turnitin as part of your assignment.

3. Assessment Rubric/Criteria

Marking will consider:

1. Understanding of tasks (whether you have a clear grasp of the tasks related to the company)

2. Quality of arguments (shows a deep and thorough understanding, whether you have   provided detailed and thorough answers for the questions asked, whether your writing is systematically backed up by references and you have provided good examples)

3. Clarity of language (including spellings and grammar)

Overall structure (including formatting and whether references to other works are accurately cited)

4. Feedback

Feedback on your assignment will normally be provided via Moodle. Generic (class-level) feedback and grade profiles will normally be posted on Moodle.

Students can use academic staff office hours for additional feedback on your work.

5. Submitting

Submit your coursework using the named submission link in the Assessment Section of your Course Moodle page. Take care to submit by the deadline or you may face lateness penalties.

Document creation- Group Written

1.   Please name files in the following way:  GroupNo_CourseCode_QuestionNo.  e.g. Group3_ACCFIN4099_1.  If there is no question choice, use 1 as the default.

2.   The file type must be .doc,. .doxc, .xls, .xlsx or .pdf.

3.   Include your group number in your document, ideally in the header on each page with the course code and title, e.g. Group3_ACCFIN1003_Finance1.

4.   One designated member of the group should submit the file to Moodle.

5.  All group members will upload a peer assessment and self-reflection form, using the naming convention GroupNo_CourseCode_StudentNo.  e.g.

Group3_ACCFIN4099_2371231.

6.   The maximum file size limit on Moodle is 230MB.

6. Student conduct

Referencing and bibliography

For information, please goto theUniversity Library webpage.

Plagiarism

For advice and more information, please go to:

•   Student Learning Development web pages

•   University Plagiarism Statement

If you make use of AI at any point in your research or writing process, no matter at what

stage, you must acknowledge the use of that source/platform as you would any other piece of evidence/material in your submission.

Turnitin

Your coursework will be processed through Turnitin for similarity checking.  You can submit a draft of your coursework to Turnitin before submitting your final copy.  You will find information about using Turnitin in the Student Information Point Moodle [USIP/PSIP]

7. Generative AI

Generative AI offers many new opportunities for learning and the development of academic   skill although, like any technology, it must be used judiciously.  Students should consider the data protection and privacy issues that can be caused by using AI.  Consider how your

personal information will be used before signing up to AI tools and ensure you read any data protection policies before interacting with AI.  You should not feel pressured into using AI tools if you are uncomfortable with the data protection or privacy issues.  Bear in mind that responses to AI queries can be biased due to the inherent biases present in their training data.  This can lead to unfair and discriminatory responses.

Copying (including paraphrasing) AI responses to queries would be considered as plagiarism, as it would for copying the response from any internet search.

Further information can be foundhere.

8. Extensions and non-submission with good cause

Extension of up to 5 days

If you experience extenuating circumstances which prevent you from completing your assessment by the deadline, you can request an extension of up to 5 days via Moodle.

Good cause for non-submission, late submission and extension of more than 5 days

We understand that during your studies, events that you cannot control (e.g., death of a family member, personal circumstances, physical and mental ill health, etc.) may impact your ability to perform. well in or complete assessments.

If you are experiencing such circumstances, you can submit a good cause claim in MyCampus.

You have five working days from the assessment deadline date to submit your good cause  claim. If you are prevented from submitting your claim within five days for good reason, you must detail this in your claim. You will receive an acknowledgement on MyCampus when

you submit. After you have submitted your claim, you have five working days to retract it.

If you have any questions, please contact your subject team:

business-accounting-finance@glasgow.ac.uk