Which of the Following Statements Is CORRECT? Assume That the Firm

question 40

Multiple Choice

Which of the following statements is CORRECT? Assume that the firm is a publicly-owned corporation and is seeking to maximize shareholder wealth.

• A) If a firm's managers want to maximize the value of their firm's stock, they should, in theory, concentrate on project risk as measured by the standard deviation of the project's expected future cash flows.
• B) If a firm evaluates all projects using the same cost of capital, and the CAPM is used to help determine that cost, then its risk as measured by beta will probably decline over time.
• C) Projects with above-average risk typically have higher than average expected returns.Therefore, to maximize a firm's intrinsic value, its managers should favor high-beta projects over those with lower betas.
• D) Project A has a standard deviation of expected returns of 20%, while Project B's standard deviation is only 10%.A's returns are negatively correlated with both the firm's other assets and the returns on most stocks in the economy, while B's returns are positively correlated.Therefore, Project A is less risky to a firm and should be evaluated with a lower cost of capital.
• E) If a firm has a beta that is less than 1.0, say 0.9, this would suggest that the expected returns on its assets are negatively correlated with the returns on most other firms' assets.

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Definitions:

Markup

A pricing strategy where a fixed amount or percentage is added to the cost of a product to determine its selling price.

Predetermined Overhead Rate

A rate used to allocate manufacturing overhead costs to produced goods, based on estimated costs and activity levels.

Direct Labor-Hours

A measure of the actual labor time spent on producing goods, often used to allocate manufacturing overhead to products.

Plantwide Predetermined Rate

A single overhead absorption rate calculated for an entire manufacturing plant, used to allocate manufacturing overhead to individual products.