Aes - Hbs Case Study

Free cash flows of the project for next five years can be calculated by adding depreciation values and subtracting changes in working capital from net income. In 2010, there will be a cash outflow of $2.2 million as capital expenditure. In 2011, there will be an additional one time cash outflow of $300,000 as an advertising expense. Using net free cash flow values for next five years and discount rate for discounting, NPV for the project comes out to be $2907, 100. The rate of return at which net present value becomes zero i.e.

We assume that risk free rate (Rf) equals rate of long-term Treasury Bonds (as the project’s life is 10 years), so Rf = 9.5%.

1. Should Arauco build the Nueva Aldea project? (Hint: Estimate the project Net Present Value and provide a recommendation considering quantitative and qualitative arguments)

1. How would you evaluate the capital budgeting method used historically by AES? What’s good and bad about it?

Moreover, Robert Gates’ estimation of the price increase (2.0%) differs from the information provided in the case (1.7%). This overestimates revenue and thereby FCF. To make better projections for the firms’ FCF, Robert Gates would also have to consider the opportunity cost of alternative investments, the risk exposure throughout the project and operational risks after three years.

a) Discounted cash flows from the projects by the suitable division of a hurdle rate to get the net present value which financially makes sense since risks among different divisions do vary.

Southwest traditionally uses a 5% premium over the weighted average cost of capital as a discount rate for long-term projects. This makes certain that the project will only have a positive net present value and be worth the investment if it gives investors a premium for the additional risk they must take on. The expected return on the project of 14.5% gives a 5.9% premium over the calculated

Project 1 embedded risk can be assessed by evaluating the market risk, success/failure rate of the project.

"a. If each project's cost of capital is 12%, which project should be selected? If the cost of capital is 18%, what

Groupe Ariel SA of France is considering a project in Mexico. They need to analyze the net present value of the project, keeping in mind the exchange rates between Mexican Pesos and Euros in order to maximize their return. They also need to keep in mind the inflation rates over time and the risks involved with this type of investment.

3) What is the weighted average cost of capital and why is it important to estimate it? Is the

The present value of the net incremental cash flows, totaling $5,740K, is added to the present value of the Capital Cost Allowance (CCA) tax shield, provided by the Plant and Equipment of $599K, to arrive at the project’s NPV of $6,339K. (Please refer to Exhibit 4 and 5 for assumptions and detailed NPV calculations.) This high positive NPV means that the project will add a significant amount of value to FMI. In addition, using the incremental cash flows (excluding CCA) generated by the NPV calculation, we calculated the project’s IRR to be 28%. This means that the project will generate a higher rate of return than the company’s cost of capital of 10.05%. This is also a positive indication that the company should undertake the project.

The use of an accounting rate of return also underscores a project 's true future profitability because returns are calculated from accounting statements that list items at book or historical values and are, thus, backward-looking. According to the ARR, cash flows are positive due to the way the return has been tabulated with regard to returns on funds employed. The Payback Period technique also reflects that the project is positive and that initial expenses will be retrieved in approximately 7 years. However, the Payback method treats all cash flows as if they are received in the same period, i.e. cash flows in period 2 are treated the same as cash flows received in period 8. Clearly, it ignores the time value of money and is not the best method employed. Conversely, the IRR and NPV methods reflect that The Super Project is unattractive. IRR calculated is less then the 10% cost of capital (tax tabulated was 48%). NPV calculations were also negative. We accept the NPV method as the optimal capital budgeting technique and use its outcome to provide the overall evidence for our final decision on The Super Project. In this case IRR provided the same rejection result; therefore, it too proved its usefulness. Despite that, IRR is not the most favorable method because it can provide false results in the case where multiple negative

5. The project is assumed to end in year 4. Do you think that this is realistic? Can you estimate the value of the project’s operating cash flows beyond year 4? State any assumptions you made.

The following paper analyzes a project from financial perspectives using the capital budgeting techniques like Net Present Value (NPV) and Internal Rate of Return (IRR).