Reference no: EM131397

The cost of capital for a firm can vary from the cost of capital for each of its businesses. When a firm has multiple businesses, it is significant to use the cost of capital appropriate to the particular project under consideration, instead of the firm's overall cost of capital, when computing a proposed project. Renowned Cola, Inc.'s 2005 annual report describes that Renowned Cola's investments are expected to produce cash returns which exceed its "long-term cost of capital," which Renowned Cola estimated to be around 10% at year-end 2005. Renowned Cola has three main lines of business, soft drinks, notably Dr. Cola; snack foods, such as Fritos and restaurants. Restaurant investments comprise NPC, which has a beta of 0.80 and a debt-to-firm value ratio is 0.31. Renowned Cola did not report costs of capital separately for such three businesses. Below, we have available year-end data for 2005 provided by Renowned Cola.

Renowned Cola's Items                        Values (M = millions)

Cash and marketable securities             $1,498M (market value assumed)

Short-term debt                                 $706M

Long-term debt                                  $8,509M ($8,747M market value)

Common shares outstanding                  788M

Year-end share price                           $55.875

Income tax rate                                  34%

Renowned Cola's beta                          1.0

Long-term borrowing rate                     6.75% Short-term riskless rate 5.13%

Intermediate-term riskless rate              5.50%

Long-term riskless rate                         6.00%

Short-term market risk premium              8.40%

Intermediate-term market risk premium    7.40%

Long-term market risk premium               7.00%

Given the above information, answer the questions below:

i) Compute the market value of Renowned Cola's debt at year-end 2005. What is the book value of debt? Why do generally use market or book values for debt? Describe.

ii) To the nearest million, compute the market value of Renowned Cola's stockholders' equity at year-end 2005.

iii) Renowned Cola subtracts the value of its short-term debt from its total debt when computing its "net debt ratio." Renowned Cola believes that the market values for its traded debt are not precise as the bonds trade infrequently. Given this belief and their treatment of short-term debt, compute Renowned Cola's net debt ratio by using book values for debt and market value for equity.

iv) Determine Leverage keeping the short-term debt as part of total debt. By using the CAPM calculate re for short-term, medium-term, and long-term investments. Calculate WACC for short-term, medium-term and long-term investments. Assume that you were considering a long-term capital investment project, which WACC would you use and why? You can suppose that the asset's risk profile for the project mirrors Renowned Cola's overall risk profile.

v) Must renowned Cola use its overall cost of capital to assess its restaurant capital investments? Beneath what conditions would it be correct to do so?