Assignment 1: Financial Research Report

Part 2 Due Week 9 and worth 200 points

Imagine that you are a financial manager researching investments for your client. Think of a friend or a family member as a client. Define her/his characteristics and goals such as an employee or employer, relatively young (less than 40 years) or close to retirement, having some savings /property, risk taker or risk averter, etc. Next, use the Strayer University library, located at https://research.strayer.edu, to research the stock of any U.S. publicly traded company that you may consider as an investment opportunity for your client. Your investment should align with your client’s investment goals. (Note: Please ensure that you are able to find enough information about this company in order to complete this assignment. You will create an appendix, in which you will insert related information.)

Your final financial research report will be 6-8 pages and be completed in two parts as noted below. This assignment requires you to use at least 5 quality academic resources and covers the following topics:

• Rationale for choosing the company in which to invest
• Ratio analysis
• Stock price analysis
• Recommendations

Write a six to eight (6-8) page paper in which you:

Part 1 Due Week 7 (one to two (1-2) pages in addition to the annotated bibliography):

1. Provide a rationale for the stock that you selected, indicating the significant economic, financial, and other factors that led you to consider this stock.
2. Suggest the primary reasons why the selected stock is a suitable investment for your client. Include a description of your client’s profile.
3. Conduct a literature review and prepare an annotated bibliography of at least 150 words for each of the five (5) resources you’ll use to complete this assignment and begin to build your reference list. Remember you must use at least (5) quality academic resources for the final assignment.Part 2 Due Week 9 (six to eight (6-8) pages including #1 and #2 from Part 1):
   1. Include your rationale, primary reasons for stock selection, and client’s profile from Part 1, making any revisions based upon Part 1 feedback if applicable.
   2. Select any five (5) financial ratios that you have learned about in the text. Analyze the past three (3) years of the selected financial ratios for the company; you may obtain this information from the company’s financial statements. Determine the company’s financial health. (Note: Suggested ratios include, but are not limited to, current ratio, quick ratio, earnings per share, and price earnings ratio.)
   3. Based on your financial review, determine the risk level of the stock from your investor’s point of view. Indicate key strategies that you may use in order to minimize these perceived risks.
   4. Provide your recommendations of this stock as an investment opportunity. Support your rationale with resources, such as peer-reviewed articles, material from the Strayer University Library, and reviews by market analysts.
   5. Use at least five (5) quality academic resources in this assignment. Note: Wikipedia and other similar websites do not qualify as academic resources.

   Your assignment must follow these formatting requirements:

   • Be typed, double spaced, using Times New Roman font (size 12), with one-inch margins on all sides; citations and references must follow APA or school-specific format. Check with your professor for any additional instructions.

   • Include a cover page containing the title of the assignment, the student’s name, the professor’s name, the course title, and the date. The cover page and the reference page are not included in the required assignment page length.

   The specific course learning outcomes associated with this assignment are:

   • Critique financial management strategies that support business operations in various market environments.

   • Analyze financial statements for key ratios, cash flow positions, and taxation effects.

   • Review fixed income strategies using time value of money concept, bond valuation methods, and interest rate calculations.

   • Estimate the risk and return on financial investments.

   • Apply financial management options to corporate finance.

   • Determine the cost of capital and how to maximize returns.

   • Formulate cash flow analysis for capital projects including project risks and returns.

   • Evaluate how corporate valuation and forecasting affect financial management.

   • Analyze how capital structure decision-making practices impact financial management.

   • Use technology and information resources to research issues in financial management.

   • Write clearly and concisely about financial management using proper writing mechanics.

Constructing Deductive and Inductive Arguments

Arguments consist of premises and conclusions. Premises are structured so as to lend support to conclusions. The kind of support that a premise lends to a conclusion allows us to distinguish between deductive and inductive arguments. This week, you will be constructing both kinds of arguments.

1.In three premises each, construct one example of each following deductive argument form:

Modus ponens

Modus tollens

Hypothetical syllogism

Disjunctive syllogism

Make sure your arguments are deductively valid and that your examples are your own. Here are two examples of the general format that your arguments should take:

Modus ponens:

1.If it is raining, then it is pouring.

2.It is raining.

3.Therefore, it is pouring.

Modus tollens:

1.If Jack went to the grocery store, then he bought cookies.

2.Jack did not buy cookies.

3.Therefore, Jack did not go to the grocery store.

2.After you construct the preceding deductive argument forms, construct a three premise syllogism. For example:

1.All men are mortal.

2.Socrates is a man.

3.Therefore, Socrates is mortal.

3.After you construct a three premise syllogism, construct one of each of the following inductive argument patterns:

Induction by enumeration

Reasoning by analogy

Statistical induction

Higher-level induction

Your examples of inductive argument patterns should not be expressed in premise form. Rather, they should be informally expressed in writing. You should have one paragraph for each pattern. Be as detailed as possible.

Finally, please remember to label your arguments. This makes it easier for them to be graded. Include your name, course section, and the date at the top of your assignment document

Step 1: Find a piece of art. It can be from a museum, public art, or street art (murals, stencil art but not letters aka graffiti). The art can be two or three – dimensional.

Step 2: Record yourself talking about the art. Discuss what is so special about the piece to you. You must provide a visual analysis utilizing the Principles of Design and items from the Visual Toolbox. If the artwork is 3-dimension, discuss sculptural terminology. Use terminology that applies to the type of artwork you have chosen. If you are able to provide some information about the artist, do so. Don’t forget to tell me where the artwork is located. Also, be sure to include good shots of the artwork that you are discussing.

• For Cuckoo’s Calling, this worksheet should include: pages pgs. 421-456

To receive full credit, please submit an annotation worksheet for your reading of that entire section.

Here is the blank Annotation Worksheet template in both docx and pdf format.

Click here for the Annotation Worksheet Template in .docx format.

Click here for the the Annotation Worksheet Template in .pdf format.