個案總覽

Two managers attending a financial management course are attempting to compute the cost of capital for Sun Hung Kai Properties Limited, a well-known local Hong Kong firm. The two managers are somewhat confused about the costs of various sources of capital, the calculation of the overall corporate cost of capital, and the appropriate use of the hurdle rate.

Several large Canadian public companies announced their intent to merge and use the pooling of interests method rather than the traditional purchase method. Pooling had been rarely used to account for business combinations in Canada. The case focus is on an analyst who wanted to ensure that she understood the differential impact of both methods so that she could more fully represent her clients' interests. She decided to use an analysis of the recent merger of TransCanada Pipelines and NOVA Corporation to help her better understand and evaluate the two alternative accounting methods and their impact on the financial statements.

The comptroller at Four Star Fitness Club must set aside a financial reserve to cover possible refunds of initiation fees to new members. The comptroller has some historical data on refund payments to assist in estimating the size of the appropriate reserve.

Harry Lev was reviewing the recent sales reports for Bamberger's Department Store in an effort to assess whether or not the newly implemented Wednesday evening late openings had had a positive overall effect on sales. He was under some pressure to demonstrate that the sales during the extended hours were more than covering the added cost to the store of the late opening, since he had been instrumental in initiating this change despite strong employee resistance. If he could not clearly show a financial benefit, he could expect pressure to discontinue the experiment. (A Microsoft Excel data file is available for use with this case, product 7A99E006.)

The head of a bank's Mexico Team must consider her options when confronted with the task of aiding in the arrest of one of her clients. She had just returned from Switzerland, where Swiss narcotics agents were encouraging her to lay a trap for the wife of one of her clients, the brother of a former Mexican president, who had been arrested in Mexico a few months earlier on charges of murder, illegal enrichment, and laundering money for the Mexican drug cartel. As she pondered her options, the fate of one of her former employees, who had recently been sentenced to 10 years imprisonment for managing the account of a convicted money launderer, provided food for thought. She must consider extraterritoriality, bank secrecy laws, and professional ethics in international private banking.