Question 1. The Apex Company has just hired Mr. Smith, who is age 25 and is expected to retire at age 60. Mr. Smith’s current salary is $30,000 per year, but his wages are expected to increase by 5 percent annually over the next 35 years. Apex has a defined benefit pension plan in which workers receive 2 percent of their final year’s wages for each year of employment. Assume a world of certainty. Further, assume that all payments occur at year-end. What is Mr. Smith’s expected annual retirement benefit, rounded to the nearest thousands of dollars?
a. $ 35,000
b. $ 57,000
c. $ 89,000
d. $116,000
e. $132,000
Question 2. Midwest Investment Consultants (MIC) operates several stock investment portfolios that are used by firms for investment of pension plan assets. Last year, one portfolio had a realized return of 12.6 percent and a beta coefficient of 1.15. The average T-bond rate was 7 percent and the realized rate of return on the S&P 500 was 12 percent. What was the portfolio’s alpha?
a. -0.75%
b. -0.15%
c. 0%
d. 0.15%
e. 0.75%
Question 3. The Ritz Company has a 40-year-old employee that will retire at age 60 and live to age 75. The firm has promised a retirement income of $20,000 at the end of each year following retirement until death. The firm’s pension fund is expected to earn 7 percent annually on its assets and the firm uses 7% to discount pension benefits. What is Ritz’s annual pension contribution to the nearest dollar for this employee? (Assume certainty and end-of-year cash flows.)
a. $2,756
b. $3,642
c. $4,443
d. $4,967
e. $5,491