This paper contains the statistics of the Equity Premium or Market Risk Premium (MRP) used in 2011 for 56 countries. We got answers for 85 countries, but we only report the results for 56 countries with more than 6 answers. Most previous surveys have been interested in the Expected MRP, but this...

This paper addresses 10 corporate finance topics that are not well treated (or not treated at all) in many Corporate Finance Books. The topics are: 1. Where does the WACC equation come from? 2. The WACC is not a cost. 3. What is the WACC equation when the value of the debt is not equal to its...

English Abstract: During the last 10 years (2001-2011), the average return of the mutual funds in Spain (1.3%) was smaller than the average inflation. Nevertheless, on December 31, 2011, 4.9 million investors had 128 billion euros in the 2,471 existing mutual funds. Only 1 of the 368 mutual...

English Abstract: During the last 10 years, the average return of the pension funds in Spain was lower than the inflation and than the return of Government Bonds. Only 2 funds (out of 532) had a return higher than the return of Government Bonds. Nevertheless, on December 31, 2011, 5.1 million...

Mehra and Prescott (1985) argued that, according to sensible asset pricing models, stocks should provide at most a 0.35% premium over bills. However, companies use higher equity premia (average around 6%) for evaluating their investment projects, professors use in class and in their textbooks...

The value of tax shields depends only on the nature of the stochastic process of the net increases of debt. The value of tax shields in a world with no leverage cost is the tax rate times the current debt plus the present value of the net increases of debt. By applying this formula to specific...

On April 16, 2012 the Argentine Federal Government decreed the intervention of YPF and expropriated of 51% of the YPF shares owned by Repsol. Repsol had a 57.4% stake. A tribunal will determine the compensation Repsol will receive for its YPF shares. You are required to help the tribunal. What...

Company valuation using discounted cash flows is based on the valuation of the Government bonds: it consists of applying the procedure used to value the Government bonds to the debt and shares of a company. This is easy to understand (sections 1, 2 and 3). But company valuation is complicated by...

English Abstract: This document contains 71 simple finance exam questions. It also provides their solutions as well as 1481 incorrect answers, which out of respect for their authors (all of whom have advanced degrees from different countries) are called “innovative,” “progressive” or...

Spanish Abstract: Esta nota contiene un caso real de una empresa que tenía un crédito con tipo de interés variable y contrató un swap para pagar tipo de interés fijo y eliminar su riesgo de interes. La nota tambien contiene 30 comentarios sobre el swap y varias contestaciones a los mismos...