Price, Value, Market Economy and Regulations

By definition, Price of a product is the money paid for it in an arm’s length transaction, whereas, Value of an asset is the intrinsic cash generation power of that asset or the value of intrinsic utility it provides to the one consuming it.

Theoretically, Price should be same as the Value and it is Prices that determine allocation of resources in an Economy. Objective is to utilize limited available resources in such a combination so as to produce maximum Value in total.

For example, if cars are priced higher than corn, it is but prudent that resources that can produce cars should be allocated there, and not misallocated to produce corn. So, in a country, based on its available resources and Prices of different products it produces, we can get a particular combination of resource allocation that maximizes its GDP.

Now, if Prices are distinctly away from intrinsic Values of their respective products, resources in the society will be misallocated and society will not be able to achieve its full Value Creation Potential. So, it is important to understand that there is a huge implication if Prices and Values are out of sync.

There are 2 systems that economies pursue for determining product Prices.

1. Command System
2. Market System.

In a Command System, Prices are determined by the State. It is assumed that Prices determined by them are accurate and close to their respective intrinsic values. But historically, as in case of former USSR and Eastern European countries, this system did not work and their economies collapsed.

In a Market System, Prices are left to be determined in the market, based on Demand and Supply principles. Theoretically, this looks like an ideal system, where Equilibrium Prices could be close to their intrinsic Values and could also keep current with any changes in conditions. But recent financial crisis has exposed two major vulnerabilities of this system.

1. Information Gap: One big assumption of Demand Supply Principle to determine Prices is that both parties in a transaction have the same level of information. If this assumption does not hold then Prices will be distinctly away from their respective intrinsic Values. For example, if selling party has more information than the buying party, Prices will be higher than what they should be. And if this information gap remains for a critical period, it may result in formation of Bubbles.

2. Price Volatility: Since Prices are determined by market Demand and Supply, they are bound to fluctuate in keeping up with ever changing conditions. This results in additional costs to businesses in form of Hedging Costs and an added Cost of Production in the economy.

This is where in a Market Economy; State must play a role by putting in Regulations. Regulations must ensure that no Information Gap exists and irrespective of complexities of financial instruments used, information should be available to all transacting parties in complete and full.

Evaluation of Firm for Venture Capital Financing

Once a Venture Capital Firm has looked into the firm seeking finance and is also willing to finance an agreed sum, the next issue is how much of ownership should the Venture Capital Firm seek in lieu of its funding?

This is generally a negotiable process between Entrepreneurs and the Venture Capital firm. However, the evaluation process described below is only used as a baseline for these negotiations. The term given to this mostly used evaluation method is known as ‘Venture Capital Method’.

Objective of the Venture Capital firm is to finance an upcoming firm, for a Limited Period, in return for an Equity Ownership in that firm. It will seek to sell out its stake at the end of that period thru an IPO or a Private sale. Length of this period is very important to the Venture Capital Firm, as its capital will be tied up into Entrepreneur Firm for such expected period.

Evaluation Process begins by having Forecasted Statements of Earnings, prepared by Entrepreneur Firm for the period of Venture Capital Investment. Now, based on Final Period forecasted Earnings from this statement, Value of the Firm is determined using a comparable market P/E multiple. For example, if final period earnings are $1m and average P/E multiple of listed firms in the same industry as the Entrepreneur Firm is 10x, then the Value of the Entrepreneur Firm at the end of Financing Period is 1 X 10 = $10m.

Next, the terminal value of $10m is discounted to today’s value using an appropriate Discount Rate (say 30%). That would give us the Value of the Firm as of today.

Knowing the value of the firm as of today (say $2m) and knowing the funding asked for (say $1m), ownership percentage of Venture Capital Firm would be $1m/$2m = 50%.

As we see, there are several assumptions used in this process.

· Earnings Forecast is a big assumption and is expected to be overly optimistic as it is prepared by Entrepreneurs.
· Comparable P/E is another assumption. Usually, it will be difficult to find existing listed firms of the similar size and industry as the Entrepreneur Firm.
· Discount Rate is another assumption.

Venture Capital firm will negotiate on Earnings Forecast for them to be consistent with appropriate risks it sees. Another way to reduce value would be to reflect those risks in the Discount Rate used. If Cash flows are overly optimistic, Discount Rate could be higher to subdue them.

So, during negotiations, Projected Earnings/Cash Flows is where Entrepreneurs could be optimistic and Discount Rate is where Venture Capital firm can be pessimistic. So, both have their negotiation tools in the valuation process.

Another issue for Venture Capital Firm is to know, if Entrepreneurs are planning any future Venture Capital financing in that firm. If they are, then, any such future funding will dilute their existing ownership. But, if these future fundings are known at the time of first financing, Venture Capital firm would increase their ownership proportionately, so as to get its expected ownership after any future dilution/s.

To summarize, objective of this evaluation is not to project an accurate value for that firm, but rather to provide a good basis for any negotiated value.

Cash, Liquidity and Working Capital Management

Quite often the terms, Cash Management, Liquidity Management and Working Capital Management seem to be used interchangeably. These functions may be related and may provide effective inputs to each other, but, their scope under management is distinctly different.

Working Capital Management involves your current assets in Inventory and Receivables and your current liabilities under Payables. The scope under this function is to manage the amount required as Working Capital, its duration and different ways of financing it. Please see my earlier blog for more details in managing this function.

Cash Management involves management of your Cash Flows. Under its scope there are three categories of Cash Flows to be managed:
· Cash Inflows
· Cash Concentrations
· Cash Disbursements
The objective is to establish and manage cost effective processes that will speed up your Collections and Concentration and optimally delay your Disbursements.

Liquidity Management function is to manage availability of Cash to make payments on your obligations as and when they become due. Need for Liquidity Management arises from the fact that businesses have uncertain and asynchronous timings between their Cash Receipts (from Sales) and their various other payment obligations. Decisions on when, how much and how to finance for any gaps and decisions on how to invest excess liquidity are core parts of this functionality.

S.W.I.F.T. - A Funds Transfer Network ?

SWIFT is an Industry-Owned Interbank Communication Network to exchange Financial Messages in Standard Formats, between its member Banks. Since 2007, SWIFT has also opened memberships for Corporates, thru MACUG and SCORE Arrangements. And with that Corporates too can communicate with their Banks using this network.

But many in Corporate World mistake SWIFT as a complete Payment System, including Value Transfer for funds. This is not true.

Technically, a complete Payment System consists of three stages in its process:
· Payment Instructions
· Clearing
· Settlement

A SWIFT payment message (e.g. MT101) only caters to the first part of this process, i.e. providing Payment Instructions. Clearing and Settlements are not catered for by SWIFT Network itself. Though in the Payment Instructions, there could be a mention of which Clearing and Settlement method is to be used for processing that payment.

Usually SWIFT Payments are settled thru Correspondent Banks. But if there is another desired method to be used (e.g. CHIPS for a payment in the US or CHAPS in UK), it could be mentioned in Payment Instructions message, along with other additional information for such settlements.

So, it is important to know that SWIFT only provides communication of Payment Instructions and it is NOT a Funds Transfer Network. For Funds Transfer, it gives you the flexibility to choose whatever Clearing and Settlement method desired for your payment.

Working Capital Management

What is Working Capital?

By its definition Working Capital = Current Assets – Current Liabilities

But for Management purposes, significant Accounts under Current Assets and Current Liabilities are Inventory, Account Receivables and Account Payables. These are Accounts whose values and turnovers determine the Cash Conversion Cycle. Cash Conversion Cycle is the time taken between Cash Outflows for purchasing Inventory to the time when Cash Inflows are materialized by selling that Inventory. For a given level of Sales, Companies strive for minimizing this cycle time, to achieve greater Profitability and higher Return on Assets (ROA). But managing Working Capital is not just trying to minimize CCC (Cash Conversion Cycle), there is more to that.

What is the need for managing Working Capital?

The need for managing Working Capital arises from the fact that Sales are usually Volatile and Unpredictable. This volatility in Sales gets transferred spontaneously to Current Accounts like Inventory, Account Payables, Account Receivables, Accrued Wages and Accrued Taxes.

For example, when Sales increase:
· More Inventory is bought to support increasing Sales. Inventory Account goes up and so does Account Payables.
· Additional labor is employed to sustain increased production activity and hence Accrued Wages go up.
· With additional income from Operations, Accrued Taxes go up.
· And with increased Sales, Account Receivables go up.

With this spontaneous increase in your Current Assets, you need to plan for additional funds to Finance these swollen Assets. Yes, part of this is financed automatically by your suppliers thru Account Payables, but for the remaining funds and duration, financing needs to be managed. And your Working Capital Management plan needs to take care of both, increasing as well as decreasing Sales.

You need to consider a mix of the following two Strategies to come up with a Plan:

1. Investment Strategy
2. Financing Strategy

1. Investment Strategy: This is to plan how much you want to Invest in your Current Asset Accounts. Basically you are planning on the size of your Cash Conversion Cycle (CCC), we talked earlier. Based upon your top level Business Strategy and your Industry Environment, you could either go for a Restrictive Investment Strategy or a Relaxed Investment Strategy.

a) Restrictive Investment Strategy: In a Restrictive Strategy, you plan to minimize your CCC by minimizing your levels of Inventory, following a tight Credit Policy for Receivables and plan on using Supplier Credit for its full allowed term. Your gain is lower investment in Current Assets, higher Profitability and Higher ROI. But your risk is missing out on potential upward swings in Sales due to lower inventory and tighter customer credit.

b) Relaxed Investment Strategy: In this strategy, your Investment in Current Assets is higher by maintaining higher Inventory Levels and a more relaxed Customer Credit Policy. You may be having higher gross profits in your business and your higher investment in Current Assets is well compensated by your Potential Increased Sales.

2. Financing Strategy: This strategy considers how you want to finance your Current Assets. You have options of financing them with either Long Term or Short Term loans or with a mixed of both. In general, Short Term loans are less costly (as normally, yield curve is upward sloping, meaning, short term interest rates are usually lower than long term interest rates). But disadvantage with Short Term Loans is higher Interest Rate Risk. Meaning, if you need financing now and current market rates are high, you have no option but to take it with higher rates. Also, with short term loans, there is a risk of their availability. For example, under recessionary conditions, as in present times, it may not be available to you, or, your credit ratings have changed and it is more costly now, even though it is available.

With using Long Term Loans to finance your Current Assets, you may have locked down a fixed rate loan for a long term, or may have hedged your Floating loan for Fixed and have thus eliminated any Interest Rate risks. But, you are usually paying a higher rate of Interest. Also, as your Current Asset Accounts are spontaneously fluctuating with Sales, you will have excess Liquidity when your Sales are low. This will further decrease your profitability.

Now, before going further into which Financing Strategy could suit you, lets’ understand how Current Assets could be further sub-classified.

From your previous historical Sales, you could establish a Minimum Sales figure that your business has. And, from these minimum Sales, you could establish your minimum Current Assets required to support those. This sub-division of Current Assets forms ‘Permanent Current Assets’ part of your Current Assets. The remaining portion is classified as ‘Fluctuating Current Assets’.

Now there are broadly three ways, you could choose to plan your Financing:

a) Maturity Matching: In this, you plan to use Long Term Loans for financing your Fixed Assets and Permanent Current Assets. And, Short Term Loans to finance your Fluctuating Current Assets.

b) Conservative Policy: Under this, you plan to use Long Term Loans for financing your Fixed Assets, Permanent Current Assets and also a portion of your Fluctuating Current Assets. This portion is usually the average of your historical fluctuations. And, only the remaining part of Fluctuating Current Assets is financed using Short Term debts.

c) Aggressive Policy: Under this, you plan to use Long Term Loans to finance Fixed Assets and only a portion of Permanent Current Assets. Remaining portion of Permanent Current Assets and all of Fluctuating Current Assets are financed using Short Term Loans.

Now, based on your Sales Volatility, Line of Business, Industry and Current Economy, you could have various mixes of Investment and Financing Strategies to come up with your Working Capital Management Policy.

To summarize, establishing a Working Capital Management policy needs co-ordination from multiple departments. With Operations to optimize Inventory, with Purchasing for getting maximum Supplier Credit, with Sales for optimizing Customer Credit and with Treasury for optimally Financing it. And more importantly, this needs to cater for fluctuating Sales, external environment and also be in line with overall Business Strategy.

Adverse Selection

I had a rather annoying experience last week, with a transaction I did, related to my Notebook.

It won’t let me log in after an upgrade to Windows XP SP3, notifying me of some domain name error. I tried some online help but was not successful.

So, I opted for some professional help and gave in the notebook to a well reputed electronics hardware chain. I signed up for their Store Membership and they offered me a reduced fee of $64 to fix the problem. When I offered to pay upfront, I was told to wait till the service was done. Fair enough, I thought.

Next day, I got a call from them saying the problem could not be fixed and re-installation was the only way out. And if I wanted any data to be recovered, it would cost me additional $80! I reluctantly agreed.

After a couple of hours, I got another call from them, saying the hard-disk too needs to be replaced, and at an additional cost of $140! I agreed but was clearly annoyed this time. I inquired if they anticipated any more costs and issues before I finally got my notebook fixed! I was beginning to think if this was why they had refused upfront payment!

Anyways, I got my notebook back without any further surprises, but only after paying $220 more than what I had initially thought I would pay!

This was a typical example of Adverse Selection quite prevalent in Service Industries. Adverse Selection is when one party in a transaction has more information than the other party. And the party having more information uses it to its advantage in that transaction. As in the above example, the service person knew the health of the notebook much better than me and also knew my dependability on him for such information. There is always room for Prices to be unfair, when information levels among transacting parties are not the same. And that adversely affects Transaction Volumes and ultimately the Bottom Line at Company level.

In these times, when companies are clearly struggling with their bottom lines, it will be good if they identify any cases of adverse selections in their processes and attempt to narrow such information gaps. It will likely affect their revenues and their bottom lines in a very positive way.

Hedging Strategy

I was reading an interesting blog by Magnus Lind posted on March 12 2009. In that he says:

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“When I was a young corporate treasurer I lost a fortune on a hedge but obviously the commercial flow balanced it. However the board noticed the losses I made so they asked me to explain why I could loose so much money. I was puzzled since I only followed the policy I had proposed and they had approved. I prepared a presentation explaining the policy with an example. A board member commented: ‘We understand the principles of hedging but we are anyway surprised that you did hedge since you lost so much money. Was that really necessary?’ I was chocked! What a question, we must be consistent in our hedging otherwise we would be speculating.”

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Totally agree. We are trying to mitigate risk and not doing any speculation here. But let’s still analyze this scenario and see if it could have avoided any apprehensions from the board.

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First: The very first and the most important step in any Hedging Strategy is to define its Objective. Objective should be clear and quantifiable.

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For example, Hedging Objective for an airlines company wanting to hedge fuel cost exposure could be ‘Not to spend more than 30% of revenue on fuel costs’. If in the above case, objective was quantified and approved as straight as this, probably, board would not have had apprehensions on any hedging losses, as long as the stated and approved objective was met.

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Second: The next important step is to quantify how much of the exposure is to be hedged. Inputs for this would be a forecast of volatility of the object being hedged with scenario analysis for perceived extreme conditions, such that costs do not exceed the stated objective even under extreme upside price movements.

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Now, while Objective (outcome of the first step) could be fairly static, the outcome for second step (how much to hedge), could be more actively managed. That is, any changes to the perceived volatility down the road could be reflected with changes in how much we are hedging. If this is done, our hedging gains will insure costs being under stated limits (as prescribed in the Objective) and hedging losses will be minimized (as we are not necessarily hedging the entire exposure). And likely, not have to explain hedging losses to the board.

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Let me explain this with a simplified example.

• Let’s say, our Air Line Company will use 100 barrels of fuel for the period and has decided to spend no more than $8,000 as fuel costs. This becomes our stated objective.
• Current spot price of oil is $50 per barrel.
• Forecast upside volatility is 100%. That is we expect oil could to go up to $100 per barrel in that period.
• For simplicity, we will assume we could buy futures at $50 per barrel for hedging and will ignore any transaction costs. We get exposure %age to be hedged as 40%.
• So, we have hedged 40 barrels of oil at $50 and have left remaining 60 barrels exposed to price fluctuations.
• Worst case scenario would be when we have to buy remaining 60 barrels at extreme upside price $100 per barrel. So, in this case, our total cost of fuel would be (40 barrels * $50) + (60 barrels * $100) = $8,000. Which meets our stated objective.
• In another scenario, where instead of prices rising, they fell to say $20 a barrel. In that case, out total cost of fuel would be (40 barrels * $50) + (60 barrels * $20) = $3,200. Hedging losses are $1,200. But understand that had we hedged our total exposure, our hedging losses would have been $3,000!!

In both cases, our costs are at or below stated objectives. And while meeting those objectives, we have been able to minimize our hedging losses.

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To summarize, the key is to Actively Manage, 'how much amount is to be hedged', with changing volatility prospects, while continuing to meet stated Hedge Objectives. If we increase the amount under Hedge Management to more than what is required, we would increase our hedge gains if price movement is upwards; But this will be at the cost of higher hedge losses, if prices move downwards.

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Credit Crisis - Academics and Analysis - 4

This blog is next in the series of blogs ‘Credit Crisis – Academics and Analysis - 3’. Please read previous blogs for a better sense of flow.

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Here I will try to analyze Risk Elements with MBS securities and attempt to build a sense of what could have gone wrong.

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Borrowers pay a rate of interest for their mortgage loans. This rate includes Risk Free Rate + Risk Premium to compensate risks associated with those loans.

• We know the bubble was created because home prices kept going upwards to a point of burst. No argument on that!
• Upward movement in prices was due to lower interest rates paid by borrowers and a larger investor base making increased supply of loan-able funds. Again no argument on that!
• Larger Investor base is what we desire and going forward, we would aim to maintain/increase that. So, there is no problem with that part of equation.
• Lower Risk Free Rates, we know were controlled by FED’s Monetary Policy. Analysts have already pointed that out as one of the strong reasons for the bubble. FED kept these rates too low for too long. Again no arguments!

Now, the remaining variable in the equation is Risk Premium added to Risk Free Rate. Let’s analyze this to see, if this premium could have been cheaply charged to borrowers.

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I will organize contents of this analysis as:

• Risks for End Investors
• Risks for MBS Issuers/Guarantors
• Total Risks Analysis as against conventional Home Loans

Risks for End Investors

• Credit Risk: Since there was Guarantor party present (i.e. Ginnie Mae, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac), Credit Risk to Investors was quantified by creditworthiness and credit ratings of these guarantor parties.
• Interest Rate Risk: Same as with any other fixed income security. Security Prices will go down when Risk Free Interest Rates go up in the market. Its quantification is to be based on whether coupon is fixed or floating.
• Prepayment Risk: Higher when Interest Rates are going down.
• Liquidity Risk: Quite low as there was active secondary market for these securities.
• Unknown Product Risk: Since Investors are not so knowledgeable on these new complex structured securities, they should charge a premium for any associated uncertainties.
• Systematic Risk: With increased de-regulations from govt. combined with complex and relative unknown nature of these securities, did expose Investors to added systematic risk, which should have been accounted for in their premium.

Risk for MBS Guarantors/Issuers

• Credit Risk: Guarantors faced risk of defaults from actual borrowers.
• Impairment Risk: Collateral for safeguarding default was the home purchased by borrower. Any devaluation in the value of collateral should be a risk to account for.

Total Risk Analysis as against Conventional Home Loans

• Total Credit Risk: Since end borrower is still the same without any additional collateral, Total Credit Risk is same for this new Instrument.
• Total Interest Rate Risk: Is the same as with conventional loans. It is just transferred from Loaning Bank to End Investor.
• Total Prepayment Risk: For CMOs, this Risk has been reduced (or the combined premium demanded for this is lower), as the instrument has been able to create better matches of demand for prepayments.
• Total Liquidity Risk: This Risk has been reduced too. Earlier, Bank loans were pretty much illiquid, but these loan securities are much more liquid as they are traded in secondary markets.
• Total Impairment Risk: This risk was increased, because of high Loan to Value ratio. De-regulation allowed this ratio to go high, meaning borrowers could borrow with lowered down payments. Together with inflated home prices (collateral), this risk was increased. As Price to Cost ratio increases, so does the Impairment Risk. Supernormal Profits are difficult to be sustained in long run.
• Total New Product Risk: This was an additional risk component added with complex and innovative CMOs.
• Total Systematic Risk: This too had increased with increased deregulations.

So, we see, in Total Risk Premium to be charged to borrowers, there are downward factors like Prepayment Risk and Liquidity Risk and upward factors like Impairment Risk, New Product Risk and Systematic Risk.

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Questions forthcoming from this analysis are:

• Were all these risks and their premiums duly considered?
• Were Credit Rating agencies able to correctly indentify and quantify these Risks and rate these Securities accordingly?
• Did borrowers got away with paying lower interest rates with heavy costs to end Investors and Capital Markets as a whole?

On the hindsight of the Crisis, we know we can answer first 2 questions in negative and the last one in affirmative.

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To summarize, I cannot claim this analysis to be complete. But the idea is to expose more dimensions and create added inputs to your existing thought process.

Credit Crisis - Academics and Analysis - 3

This blog is third in the series of blogs ‘Credit Crisis – Academics and Analysis’. Please read previous blogs first, for a better sense of flow.

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Here I will try to build a basic understanding for another component of ‘Securitized Loans’, which is ‘Asset Backed Securities (ABS)’.

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Asset Backed Securities are similar in structure to Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS), which we discussed earlier. The differences are:

• For MBS, underlying assets are mortgage loans, whereas for ABS, underlying assets are most of other kind of loans. e.g. Credit Card Loans, Auto Loans, Home Equity Loans, Corporate Receivables, Student loans etc.
• Security Issuer is generally a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) for ABS, as against govt. or govt. sponsored agencies for MBS.
• ABS securities are generally shorter term securities as compared to MBS securities, so they are less prone to interest rate fluctuations and re-financing. To illustrate, Home Loans are generally for 30 years, whereas say Auto Loan would typically be for 1 to 5 years.
• When MBS is further structured into Tranches, they are known as CMOs. And when ABS is further structured into Classes/Tranches, they are known as CDOs (Collateralized Debt Obligations).

Let’s take an example of Corporate Receivables and see how ABS works for this underlying asset.

• Corporate has some Receivables. It sells them to a SPV and receives a discounted sum.
• SPV securitizes this asset and sells it to end investors.
• During the life of asset, Corporate collects receivables from its customers and pays them to SPV.
• SPV pays them back to Investors.

Motivation for Corporate

• Lower cost of credit to Corporate, as Credit Ratings of SPV are higher than the Corporate itself.
• Working Capital gets freed for further Operational Activities.

Risk Analysis

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Credit Risk to Investors

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To Investors, credit risk is based on Credit Rating of the SPV. Higher the rating, lesser would be the premium charged by investors on that security.

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Credit Risk to SPV

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SPV is exposed to Credit Risk from the Corporate itself. But, there could be Credit Enhancements agreed to by Corporate in the form of Recourse Option and Bankruptcy Remoteness. Recourse Option means, in case of any default on receivables, Corporate would be responsible. And Bankruptcy Remote option keeps these Receivable Assets away from other Creditors, in case Corporate ever files for bankruptcy. Because of such credit enhancements, Credit Ratings of SPV would always be higher than that of the Corporate itself. This reduces the cost of Credit to Corporate.

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Prepayment Risk

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Because underlying Assets in ABS have lower maturity periods (as compared to MBS), time duration of their exposure to Interest Rate fluctuations is lower. This results in lower chances of re-financing by end borrowers and hence a lower Prepayment Risk to ABS investors.

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To summarize, ABS is a structured security which enables individual and institutional investors to provide credit for various consumer and corporate loans.

Consumer and Producer Surplus

In Micro Economics, Consumer and Producer Surpluses are associated with equilibrium price of a product and efficient allocation of resources to produce that product.

I will use an example to illustrate them.

Consumer Surplus

Say, market price of a pen is 5. This is its equilibrium price derived by market factors of demand and supply. Assume, you don’t have a pen and you want to buy your first pen for writing an exam. Say, you would buy it, even if it was selling for 8. So, you are happy that you need to pay only 5 to get it. Consumer surplus for you in this transaction would be 8 - 5 = 3. However, for your 2nd pen, say you would have bought it for no more than 6. So for that transaction, your consumer surplus is 6 – 5 = 1. And say, for your 3rd pen, you wouldn’t pay more than 5. Your consumer surplus for the last purchase would be 0.

Thus, total Consumer Surplus for all consumers can be calculated from the Demand Curve as sum of [all prices above equilibrium price x Quantity demanded at those prices].

Producer Surplus

Extending the same example, let’s say Total Cost (fixed and variable) for producing that pen is 2. Producer would happily sell it for any price above 2. At market price of 3, his surplus is 1 per unit sold; at price 4, it is 2 and at price 5, his surplus is 3 per unit sold.

Thus, total Producer Surplus can be derived from the Supply Curve as sum of [all prices between total cost and equilibrium price x Quantity supplied at those prices].

Also, know that, when Equilibrium Price is determined purely by Market Factors of Demand and Supply (without any external influences like production quotas, upper/lower price limits, subsidies etc), then the SUM of BOTH, Consumer and Producer Surpluses are MAXIMIZED. That is, resources used in producing that quantity corresponding to the equilibrium price, are most efficiently allocated.

Short Selling - Debate on Uptick Rule

This financial crisis has destroyed a lot of wealth for many investors. There are many who are blaming it on Short Selling and the abolished Uptick Rule. Uptick Rule was abolished by SEC in June 2007, after being in place since 1938. Currently, SEC is encouraging a debate, if or not to put Uptick regulations back in place.

What is or rather was Uptick Rule? Uptick Rule prohibited short sale of securities, except on an uptick. Meaning, a short seller could only sell equities at a price higher than the last transaction price (higher at least by the defined uptick amount).

To me, I will take it as a market distortion rule and would support its abolition. Short Sales are important to keep markets healthy by keeping underlying prices close to their true equilibrium values. Without short sales, securities would mostly have an upward bias and be over valued. So, any regulation which discourages short sales as a correction instrument is not healthy for markets as a whole.

Having said that, it is important to understand difference between a ‘Short Sale’ and a ‘Naked Short Sale’.

In a Short Sale, seller borrows security from security owner for a short period and sells it at the market price. He is betting negatively on that company and stock, and is expecting it to be overpriced. At the end of period, seller buys it from the market (at lower prices if his bet has played correctly) and returns it back to its owner. Owner is usually an individual or institution (e.g. pension funds, ETF etc), who anyways wants to keep that security for longer term. Owner receives interest on his lending and borrower (short seller) gets to play on his bet. (If I were the owner, I would also charge premium for impairment risk on my security)

In a ‘Naked Short Sale’, seller is short selling securities without borrowing them. This is a clear distortion of market factors. He is selling something, he does not have (or no one has). His action is artificially increasing supply of that security and if the volume of this artificial supply is critical enough, it will anyways bring down the prices. This is Basic Economics; things have value, because they are scarce.

To summarize, I will take Short Selling as a healthy Correction Tool and ‘Uptick Rule’ and ‘Naked Short Selling’ as two factors distorting its correction properties. ‘Uptick Rule’ by discouraging short selling and ‘Naked Short Sales’ by abusing it.

Credit Crisis, Academics and Analysis - 2

This blog is a continuation of the previous blog ‘Credit Crisis, Academics and Analysis -1’. As mentioned there, I will try to build up an understanding for ‘Securitized Loans’, which held the biggest share in US Credit Markets up until the Credit Crunch.

Securitized Loans have been one of the greatest innovations in the recent history of Financial Markets. This Asset Class can broadly be put under 2 categories, categorized by their underlying Assets.

• Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS) – with underlying asset as Home Mortgage Loans.

- Pass Thru Securities
- Collateralized Mortgage Obligations (CMOs)

• Asset Backed Securities (ABS) – with underlying assets such as Corporate Receivables, Credit Card Receivables, Auto Loans, Student Loans, Home Equity Loans etc.

This blog, I will discuss MBS and leave ABS for next blogs.

Understanding MBS Structure

• Home Buyers are the borrowers, borrowing loans against their purchased homes.
• Banks and Financial Institutions provide them with those mortgage loans.
• Subsequently, these individual home loans are pooled together (there need to be a minimum of 300 individual loans to form one such pool) and an MBS issuer will issue securities against that pool. Once Securities have been issued and subscribed, Banks’ (Loan Issuers’) Capital is freed and they are ready to issue more loans.
• MBS issuers in the US are agencies like Ginnie Mae, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. These agencies also act as guarantors for their issued securities. Out of the three, Ginnie Mae is a Govt. Agency and its creditworthiness is backed by full faith of the US Govt. While, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are Private Agencies and their creditworthiness is rated by Credit Rating Agencies like S&P and Moody’s.
• These securities are then bought by Individual and Institutional Investors. They are similar to other coupon paying Fixed Income Securities, but could be prepaid early, and will not have any embedded options.

For Pass Thru Securities, Security Investors would get periodic Interest and any Prepaid Principal, in direct proportion to their Investment in that Mortgage Pool.

For, CMOs (Collateralized Mortgage Obligations), there are defined Tranches. That is, any prepaid Principal in the pool will first go to investors in the uppermost Tranche, till that tranche is exhausted. Investors opt for investing in specific Tranches, based on their Investment Requirements. That is, relative short term investors may prefer investing in upper tranches, whereas, long term investors like Pension Funds, Insurance Companies etc, could invest in lower tranches. Interest Payments are proportional payments to investors in all tranches, which is same as that for Pass Thru Securities.

Risk Analysis for MBS

Credit Risk

There are 2 parts to Credit Risk here.

1. Credit Risk to Investors: Credit Risk to Investors is creditworthiness of its Security Guarantor. Investors will include a premium to their asking rate, based on Credit Ratings of their Security Guarantor/Issuer. Also, understand that Credit Ratings of Guarantor may get downgraded in future. If that happens, as an investor, price of your securities will go down in secondary market.
2. Credit Risk to Guarantor: This risk to guarantor is from borrowers defaulting on their monthly payments. Since, the underlying pool is a big pool of loans (at least more than 300), cost of premium for this risk is lowered, as the risk is considered distributed over a big pool.

Prepayment Risk

For Pass Thru Security Investors, Prepayment risk will always be there, especially when Interest Rates are going down. Now, why Prepayment is considered a Risk? Because, when Interest Rates go down any prepaid amount would have to be re-invested by Investor at lower rates, thus reducing overall yield on his Security Investment.

For CMOs, however, Prepayment Risk is lower for deeper Tranches and higher for Investors in upper Tranches. For upper tranches, Prepayment Risk is higher and Credit Risk is lower. Whereas, in lower tranches, Prepayment Risk is lower at the cost of higher Credit Risk. As there is a tradeoff available between Prepayment and Credit Risk here, and there are matching requirements (demand) available among investors, combined premium for both Risks together is lowered for the Pool as a whole.

To summarize MBS:

• Home loans are financed by a wider base of investors, including individual investors. Thus more Capital is available for lending. In a conventional scenario, where a Bank lends home loan to a borrower, bank’s lending capacity is limited by Fed controlled RRR (Required Reserve Ratio).
• Financing is much more liquid, as these securities can be traded in Secondary Markets.
• Overall cost of borrowing is reduced, as risk perception is lowered for the pool as a whole.

In subsequent blogs, I will discuss ABS and analyze the crisis.

Financial and Operating Leverage - 2

In previous blog, we discussed Financial Leverage. And now, let’s talk about Operating Leverage.

Financial Leverage is to do with the Capital Structure of a firm, where as Operating Leverage is how that capital has been invested in the firm for its operations.

We know ‘Production Costs’ are broadly categorized as ‘Fixed Costs’ and ‘Variable Costs’. If a firm invests heavily in its PP&E (Property, Plant and Equipment), that is, in its fixed assets, it is increasing its ‘Fixed Costs’. Motivation for doing that is to be able to reduce ‘Variable Costs’.

Now, increase in ‘Fixed Costs’ gives firm the leverage to increase its sales and get magnified returns as compared to its competitors. Let’s see this with an example:

Example

There are 2 firms A and B. Firm A has invested heavily in its Fixed Assets and has higher Fixed Costs and lower Variable Costs as compared to another Firm B, in the same industry. Firm A has higher Operating Leverage as compared to Firm B.

Say, it is boom time and sales for both firms are 500 units each. Both have same Sales and sell at the same price. Yet, Firm A has higher Earnings than Firm B!!

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This is the magic of Operating Leverage working on Firm A’s side!!

Now the Risk Side

Again, we know higher returns are always associated with higher Risks. So what are the risks here?

Let’s go back to our example. Now, say, it is a slack time and sales for both firms have fallen to just 10 units. As seen in the figure below, Firm A with higher Operating Leverage is now making losses, whereas Form B is still showing positive earnings!
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Analysis
Other things same, with higher Operating Leverage, your point of breakeven sales would be higher as compared to a firm with lower Operating Leverage. For sales higher than the breakeven point, your gains will be higher. And for sales lower than the breakeven point your losses will be higher.

Financial And Operating Leverage - 1

In most financial reading material, you come across the term ‘leverage’ multiple limes. In this blog, I will attempt to create an understanding of what it means.

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In your early school years, you would have studied ‘levers’ in physics or mechanics. You already know, how using a lever, you can get multiplied power, which you would not have otherwise.

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In Finance it is a similar concept.

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Let me explain that with examples.

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Financial Leverage

• Let’s say you have a Business Project, which is estimated to give you a 15% return in 1 year.
• It requires an investment of $100.
• But adding up all your money, you only have $10 of your own money (equity).
• Remaining $90 (debt), you are able to borrow from the market at say 5%.
• After 1 year, as estimated, your project completed and returned $115.
• From this you pay back $90 principal plus $4.5 interest.
• Remaining amount left with you is $20.5 .
• That is, you got $20.5 on your investment of $10. Which is a hefty 105% return on your equity!
• Meaning, though your project returned only 15%, you actually got 105% return on your equity, ex all your debt obligations!!!

This is the magic of Financial Leverage. Other things same, higher your debt with respect to your equity, higher is the leverage and higher would be the return on your equity. But not so soon :)

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The Risk Side

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This higher return comes with equally higher risk. In Finance, always expect higher returns to be associated with higher risks. Let’s see how!

• Now, let’s say for your previous project, instead of 15% profit, it returned 15% loss So, after 1 year, you are left with $85.
• And you owe $94.5 to your creditors (90 + 4.5).
• You pay all of $85 you have and still owe them $9.5 .
• Your equity of $10 is all wiped out and you are filing bankruptcy as you cannot pay your remaining $9.5 obligation.

That is the Risk side of Leverage. Investors take high leverage companies as risky, so cost of their equities is higher.

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To analyze this mathematically:

• If project returns are more than the interest rate you pay on your debt, your net GAINS will be magnified by the leverage.
• But if your project returns are lower than your loan interest rate, your net LOSSES will be magnified by the leverage.

I will discuss Operating Leverage in the next blog.

Credit Crisis, Academics and Analysis – 1

This is probably going to be a series of blogs from me, so I am serializing this blog. Next, I was wondering, how and where to start and then I read an interesting blog ‘Second Engine Implosion’ by Magnus Lind and the paper from J P Morgan it refers to.

The Figure below from this paper is quite an eye opener.

Source: Federal Reserve – Flow of Funds Accounts of the United States;

Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association; Standard & Poor’s.

It shows, securitized Loans had the biggest chunk of Credit Market share.

And this is the chunk, which has been badly hit in the crisis. Or rather, this is the chunk, which has dramatically contracted and is responsible for the Credit Crunch. So, even though Bank Loans have responded positively to various stimuli, crisis in credit markets is still knee deep.

So, in next blog, I will go after these ‘Securitized Loan’ instruments and try build and understanding for them :)