Exam 19: Multinational Financial Management

Suppose hockey skates sell in Canada for 105 Canadian dollars, and 1 Canadian dollar equals 0.71 U.S. dollars. If purchasing power parity (PPP) holds, what is the price of hockey skates in the United States?

Suppose that currently, 1 British pound equals 1.98 U.S. dollars and 1 U.S. dollar equals 1.02 Swiss francs. How many Swiss francs are needed to purchase 1 pound?

Suppose a foreign investor who holds tax-exempt Eurobonds paying 9% is considering investing in an equivalent-risk domestic bond in a country with a 28% withholding tax on interest paid to foreigners. If 9% after-tax is the investor's required return, what before-tax rate would the domestic bond need to pay to provide the required after-tax return?

Suppose DeGraw Corporation, a U.S. exporter, sold a solar heating station to a Japanese customer at a price of 143.5 million yen, when the exchange rate was 140 yen per dollar. In order to close the sale, DeGraw agreed to make the bill payable in yen, thus agreeing to take some exchange rate risk for the transaction. The terms were net 6 months. If the yen fell against the dollar such that one dollar would buy 154.4 yen when the invoice was paid, what dollar amount would DeGraw actually receive after it exchanged yen for U.S. dollars?

Suppose 6 months ago a Swiss investor bought a 6-month U.S. Treasury bill at a price of $9,708.74, with a maturity value of $10,000. The exchange rate at that time was 1.420 Swiss francs per dollar. Today, at maturity, the exchange rate is 1.324 Swiss francs per dollar. What is the annualized rate of return to the Swiss investor?

Legal and economic differences among countries, although important, do NOT pose significant problems for most multinational corporations when they coordinate and control worldwide operations and subsidiaries.

Suppose 144 yen could be purchased in the foreign exchange market for one U.S. dollar today. If the yen depreciates by 8.0% tomorrow, how many yen could one U.S. dollar buy tomorrow?

Suppose a U.S. firm buys $200,000 worth of television tubes from a Mexican manufacturer for deliin 60 days with payment to be made in 90 days (30 days after the goods are received). The rising U.S. deficit has caused the dollar to depreciate against the peso recently. The current exchange rate is 5.50 pesos per U.S. dollar. The 90-day forward rate is 5.45 pesos/dollar. The firm goes into the forward market today and buys enough Mexican pesos at the 90-day forward rate to completely cover its trade obligation. Assume the spot rate in 90 days is 5.30 Mexican pesos per U.S. dollar. How much in U.S. dollars did the firm save by eliminating its foreign exchange currency risk with its forward market hedge?

Suppose 90-day investments in Britain have a 6% annualized return and a 1.5% quarterly (90-day) return. In the U.S., 90-day investments of similar risk have a 4% annualized return and a 1% quarterly (90-day) return. In the 90-day forward market, 1 British pound equals $1.65. If interest rate parity holds, what is the spot exchange rate ($/£)?

Individuals and corporations can buy or sell forward currencies to hedge their exchange rate exposure. Essentially, the process involves simultaneously selling the currency expected to appreciate in value and buying the currency expected to depreciate.

If an investor can obtain more of a foreign currency for a dollar in the forward market than in the spot market, then the forward currency is said to be selling at a discount to the spot rate.

A currency trader observes the following quotes in the spot market: 1 U.S. dollar = 122 Japanese yen 1 British pound = 2.25 Swiss francs 1 British pound = 1.65 U.S. dollars Given this information, how many yen can be purchased for 1 Swiss franc?

The cash flows relevant for a foreign investment should, from the parent company's perspective, include the financial cash flows that the subsidiary can legally send back to the parent company plus the cash flows that must remain in the foreign country.

Exchange rate risk is the risk that the cash flows from a foreign project, when converted to the parent company's currency, will be worth less than was originally projected because of exchange rate changes.

Which of the following are reasons why companies move into international operations?

The United States and most other major industrialized nations currently operate under a system of floating exchange rates.

In 1985, a given Japanese imported automobile sold for 1,476,000 yen, or $8,200. If the car still sold for the same amount of yen today but the current exchange rate is 144 yen per dollar, what would the car be selling for today in U.S. dollars?

Because political risk is seldom negotiable, it cannot be explicitly addressed in multinational corporate financial analysis.

LIBOR is an acronym for London Interbank Offer Rate, which is an average of interest rates offered by London banks to smaller U.S. corporations.

If one Swiss franc can purchase $0.76 U.S. dollars, how many Swiss francs can one U.S. dollar buy?