Assignment
Petko is a corporation subject to 35% corporate tax rate and plans to main- tain a Debt-to-Asset ratio (D/A) equal to 0.5. There is a comparable firm to Petko; and this firm has been more conservative, maintaining Debt-to-Asset ratio in the neighborhood of 0.20. Using Ordinary Least Squares Regressions, CFO has estimated the equity beta for the comparable firm to be 1.2. Based on its planned debt policy, CFO estimates that he will issue 10-year debt which will be priced at $940.56 (per face value of $1,000) and carry annual coupons of 5%. The risk-free rate is 4% and the historical average return on the market portfolio is 9%. It is believed that the debt beta of comparable firm is ZERO. However, given the aggressive leverage policy of Petko, CFO believes that the debt beta for Petko is greater than zero. You also note that Petkoís stock cur- rently trades at $20/share and the dividends/share in the most recent year were $1. Analysts expect that future dividends will grow at a rate of approximately 5% per year forever. You have been asked to estimate the WACC for Petko. CFO wants to see the following pieces of information in conjunction with your WACC estimate:
a) Debt-to-Equity Ratio (D/E) computed for the Comparable company AND Petko
b) Unlevered asset beta for the Comparable company, A.
c) Expected return on debt of Petko rD. You can ignore default risk in calculating the expected cost of debt.
d) Debt beta for Petko
e) Expected return rE on equity of Petko using CAPM
f) Weighted Average Cost of Capital for Petko (using rE from e).