AF208 – FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT

Major Assignment: Face to Face & Blended Mode

Semester 2, 2019

Weighting: This assignment is marked out of 50 marks and is worth 15% of your coursework.
For this assignment you have to write a report and do presentation (applies for face to face only).

Due Date: Week 12, 4th October, Friday 3.30pm [Fiji Time].
 Face to Face Mode
o Please hand-in your assignment at School of Accounting & Finance office before
the deadline (3.30pm Fiji Time).
o Online submission is also due at 3.30pm.
o Presentation will begin from week 13, 7th October, 2019. Presentation signup will be
open in Week 12. Copy of presentation slides to be given to the Teaching Staff at
least 5 minutes before your group’s presentation.
 Blended Mode
o Please submit your assignment in Major Assignment Dropbox – Blended Mode
Students before the deadline (3.30pm Fiji Time)
o No hard copy submission required. Submission should be done online via moodle
dropbox.
o No Presentation for blended mode students.

NOTE: Any assignment handed-in or submitted online after this time will be regarded as LATE
ASSIGNMENT and will incur penalty of 10% per day.

Assignment Details

1. This is a group assignment with 4-5 individuals per group (in same tutorials); individual
assignments will NOT be accepted.

2. The report should use font type Times New Roman, size 11 or 12 font, with 1.15 line
spacing. The report is limited to 2000 words, this excludes the Executive Summary. Any
report longer than this will be penalized. An Executive Summary of no more than 200
words.

3. Reports to be done in a professional manner with sub-headings and clearly defined

sections. Be succinct and clear. Reports must be word-processed, not hand written.

4. The assignment provides opportunity to get some practical experience applying corporate
finance principles to real firms. In the process, you will get a chance to;

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  Evaluate the risk profile of the firm, and examine the sources of risk.
 Analyze the firm’s stakeholders.
 Examine the firm’s investment choices.

5. The Firm;
 Must be listed in South Pacific Stock Exchange (SPSE) access via
http://www.spse.com.fj
 Select a firm that has plenty of publically available information with annual reports
published for the years 2014 to 2018
 DO NOT select a firm in the financial services industry.
 DO NOT commence your work until your listed firm is confirmed by your tutor.
(Signup for companies will be created on Moodle in Week 5. Group Leader will
have to choose one company after having group discussion)

6. Objective of Assessment Task;

 Develop critical and analytical skills relating to the topic areas addressed in the
course.
 Develop various research synthesizing skills.

7. Assessment Guidelines;

 In preparing for this assignment please note the following instructions.

 Students may either paraphrase or quote from the appropriate sources, please use
proper ‘in-text’ referencing i.e. Author, Date e.g. (Taylor, 2018).

 Bibliography must be generated using APA referencing style listing ALL your
reference sources. (Check pdf document on moodle for APA writing Style)

 Student need to pick appropriate sources for example, book chapter, journal articles,
official publication, etc.) that you will use in compiling this research report. (Note:
Wikipedia or Investopedia is not a trusted site to be used as reference).

 Check your assignment for possible plagiarism. Upload your draft assignment using
your respective Assignment Dropbox located under the assignment block of AF208
Moodle Page. Use the plagiarism report provided by Turn-It-In to make necessary
changes to your assignment. The final version of your assignment must have a
Similarity Index of less than or equal to 20%. When checking your assignment for
plagiarism, you can exclude the following: quotes, bibliography and common word
matches of 100.

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Note: You may need to upload your assignment a number of times and check for the Similarity
Index. Once you receive the plagiarism report and have to make changes, delete the previous
assignment draft before uploading draft before uploading the modified version. Remember to
revise the name for example AF208_Maj_Assign_SXXXXXXXX_Draft 1. Keep on uploading
and modifying before the due date until you are able to achieve an Index of less than or equal to
20%. Do not click on the SEND FOR MARKING button unless you are sure that it’s your final
version.

ALL ASSIGNMENTS SUBMITTED ONLINE MUST BE IN WORD FORMAT (PDF

FORMAT WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED OR MARKED)

 Marks will be deducted if your Similarity Index exceeds 20%. The following table
details the penalties if the Similarity Index value exceeds a certain
value/percentage.

Value of Similarity Index Deduction

0 to 20% No deduction
21 to 40% 15% of scored mark deducted from total
41 to 49% 30% of scored mark deducted from total
Above and including 50% Assignment will be returned unmarked
and student gets a grade of zero for the
assignment

 The final soft copy of your assignment should be saved as:

AF208_Maj_Assign_SXXXXXXXX_Final. Note: the student ID of your group
leader who will upload the assignment on moodle. Click on the SEND FOR
MARKING button to ensure that your final version is submitted. Ensure that only
one of you will upload assignment with noted document name.

o FACE TO FACE Students, please note that HARD COPY assignment to be

handed in should include the cover page and state who has uploaded on
moodle.

 Groups have been given more than sufficient time to complete this assignment;
therefore, late submission will have penalty of 10% deduction per day.

 Hardcopy – Face to Face Students;

o Includes the Report which is to be handed in to School of Accounting &

Finance office before the due date and time. For hardcopy include cover
page, marking rubrics as well turn-it-in report (as shown below) and attach
it after the cover page.

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  Softcopy
 Face to Face Students
o Group leader will be in-charge of uploading drafts as well as final copy of
the assignment.
o Softcopy upload should exclude Cover page, Turn-It-In report, Table of
Content, Marking Rubric. Include the Student ID numbers of each member
in Header of the pages.

 Blended Mode Students

o Softcopy is to be uploaded by one of the group members before 3.30 pm
(Fiji Time) on 4th October, 2019.
o Softcopy should exclude the turn-it-in report and marking rubrics.
Other things will be similar as the layout given below.

AF208 ASSIGNMENT SEMESTER 2, 2019 4|Page

  Assignment Layout;
i. Cover Page
ii. Turn-It-In Report
iii. Table of Content
iv. Executive Summary
v. Introduction
vi. Report (including sub-headings)
vii. Conclusion
viii. Recommendations
ix. Reference/Bibliography (Minimum of 10)
x. Appendix (include financial reports/ annual reports used)
xi. Marking Rubric

Note: Specify Word approximation for Executive Summary and Report.

NOTE: Should you need clarifications while doing this assignment, you may post your
query under the Major Assignment Help! Forum (in the Assignment block) located on the
AF208 moodle page. Students are advised to read through responses for postings made by
other students before posting their own to avoid repetition of queries.

~Best of Luck~

AF208 ASSIGNMENT SEMESTER 2, 2019 5|Page

 Major Assignment Question

You are a financial analyst for Royal Investment Ltd. You have been given a project to
analyze one of the firms listed on the South Pacific Stock Exchange (SPSE). You are
then required to recommend whether or not to invest in the particular firm based on your
analysis.

Questions to Guide your Analysis

1. Firm Analysis

 Type of business and nature of operation

 Who is the average investor in this firm (Individual or pension fund,

taxable or tax-exempt, small or large, domestic or foreign)

 Is this company where there is a separation between management and ownership? If so, is
there evidence of conflict of interest between management and shareholders?

2. Risk and Performance

 What is the risk profile of your firm? How much overall risk is there in this
firm? Where is this risk coming from? How is the risk profile changing?

 Based on its stock price, do you think this company has performed well over
the past three years? Why?

3. The following specific industry norms are available in SPSE and used as benchmarks
in this analysis:

 Liquidity: Current Ratio

 Leverage: Debt/Equity

 Profitability: Profit Margin, Return on Equity, Return on Assets;

 Market Value: Price/Book value, Price/Earnings, Dividend Yield.

AF208 ASSIGNMENT SEMESTER 2, 2019 6|Page

 Students will report on how the company performs as compared to the industry norms
and where the company stands relative to its competitors in the industry. The company’s
weak and/or strong areas of performance must be identified and recommendations for
improvement presented. See table 3 below for a sample industry comparative analysis.

Performance Area Your Company Comparable Comments

Company (either
SPSE or ASX)

Leverage:

Debt/Equity (%)

Interest Coverage

Liquidity
Current Ratio

Profitability:

Profit Margin (%)

Return on Assets (%)

Return on Equity (%)

Market Value:

Price/Book Value

Price/Earnings

Dividend Yield (%)

AF208 ASSIGNMENT SEMESTER 2, 2019 7|Page

 4. Valuation

 Considering the company’s dividends, what growth pattern would you pick for this
firm? How long will this growth last?

Marking Criteria
This assignment will be marked according to the following guidelines:
1. Content which includes the quality of source material, clear and precise
identification and evaluation of relevant issues and arguments raised as bases of
conclusions.
2. Presentation of the assignment should be logical and coherent (headings can
be used to facilitate this requirement).
3. All parts of the assignment should be integrated.
4. Writing style, including English expression, spelling and grammar.
5. Overall quality of presentation which should include
compliance with assignment instructions.
6. Compliance with USP regulations as outlined in your Course Outline.

7. Marking Rubrics are below for both Face to Face and Blended Mode is provided on the
next page.

Note:
0 marks will be awarded for any plagiarism.
Assignment Cover page should be attached to the assignment. This is available on moodle.

AF208 ASSIGNMENT SEMESTER 2, 2019 8|Page

 Marking Rubric for AF208 Face to Face Students
Comments Marks
Embark and Clarify (Introduction and 5
Executive Summary)
Find and Generate (References and citations) 5
– APA Style.
Evaluate and Reflect (Quality of Analysis and 15
Conclusion)
Analyse and synthesise (Proper subheadings, 15
paragraphs, grammar, style and turn-it-in %)
Presentation:
Integration of parts of the assignment 5
Major arguments and conclusion with 5
supported financial calculations.

Total marks 50

Marking Rubric for AF208 Blended Mode Students

Comments Marks
Embark and Clarify (Introduction and 5
Executive Summary)
Find and Generate (References and citations) 5
– APA Style.
Evaluate and Reflect (Quality of Analysis and 15
Conclusion)
Analyse and synthesise (Proper subheadings 15
and paragraphs)
Student Communicate (Sentence, grammar, 10
style, online submission and turn-it-in %)
Total marks 50

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