You hear on the news that the S&P 500 was down 2.6 % today relative to the risk-free rate (the market's excess return was
negative 2.6 % ). You are thinking about your portfolio and your investments in Zynga and Proctor and Gamble. a. If Zynga's beta is 1.3, what is your best guess as to Zynga's excess return today? b. If Proctor and Gamble's beta is 0.4, what is your best guess as to P&G's excess return today?
The excess return is the return earned above/beyond the benchmark return. This benchmark can be set at either the risk free rate or any other stock or portfolio's return.
The return on a stock is usually calculated using the CAPM equation. The CAPM considers risk free rate, the return on market and the stock's beta to calculate the expected return on a stock.
The market always has a beta of 1. Beta is the measure of the volatility of stock returns. If the excess return on the market falls or rises, the effect of this on a stock's excess return will be based on its beta.
a.
The excess return of Zynga today will be = -2.6% * 1.3 = -3.38%
b.
The excess return of P&G today will be = -2.6% * 0.4 = -1.04%
Different things being constant, a slowdown in population growth will lead to an increase in the availability of capital per worker and output per worker.
At the steady state, output per worker will grow at the rate of g while. Thus, steady state per person output growth will be same, however total output will increase at the rate n+g.
In case of transition between steady states, during the transition phase, output per worker will grow at a rate greater than g. Overtime in the long run with a fall in population growth, total output will fall while output per worker will increase.
If we lower the production cost, it will give us the ability to lower the product's price (which will attract a lot of buyers) without have to lower your revenue margin.
Lowering production costs could be accomplished through several tactics, such as : building a more modern factory, finding a cheaper resources supplier. outsourcing the labor to a cheaper country, etc
The formula for the multiplier is 1 / (1 - MPC), whereby MPC represents the marginal propensity to consume. Applying the formula to our case, we get: M (multiplier) = 1/(1-0.8) = 1/0.2 = 5. The multiplier in this economy is therefore 5.
