Arvonmääritysmallin kehittäminen sijoittajan näkökulmasta: Case F-secure

Työn tavoitteena on kehittää Microsoft Excel -taulukkolaskentaohjelmaan pohjautuva arvonmääritysmalli. Mallin avulla osaketutkimusta tekevät analyytikot ja sijoittajat voivat määrittää osakkeen fundamenttiarvon. Malli kehitetään erityisesti piensijoittajien työkaluksi. Työn toisena tavoitteena on soveltaa kehitettyä arvonmääritysmallia case-yrityksenä toimivan F-Securen arvonmäärityksessä ja selvittää mallin avulla onko F-Securen osake pörssissä fundamentteihin nähden oikein hinnoiteltu. Työn teoriaosassa esitellään arvonmäärityksen käyttökohteet ja historia, arvonmääritysprosessin vaiheet (strateginen analyysi, tilinpäätösanalyysi, tulevaisuuden ennakointi, yrityksen arvon laskeminen), pääoman kustannuksen määrittäminen ja sijoittajan eri arvonmääritysmenetelmät, joita ovat diskontattuun kassavirtaan perustuvassa arvonmäärityksessä käytettävät mallit sekä suhteellisen arvonmäärityksentunnusluvut. Empiirinen osa käsittää arvonmääritysmallin kehittämisen ja rakenteen kuvauksen sekä F-Securen arvonmääritysprosessin. Vaikka F-Securen tulevaisuus näyttää varsin valoisalta, osake on hinnoiteltu markkinoilla tällä hetkellä(23.02.2006) korkeammalle kuin näihin odotuksiin nähden olisi järkevää. Eri menetelmät antavat osakkeelle arvoja 2,25 euron ja 2,97 euron väliltä. Kehitetty Excel -malli määrittää F-Securen osakkeen tavoitehinnaksi eri menetelmien mediaanina 2,29 euroa. Tutkimuksen tuloksena F-Securen osaketta voidaan pitää yliarvostettuna, sillä sen hinta pörssissä on 3,05 euroa.

The Role of an Enterprise Portal in Knowledge Management Strategy, Case: Private Equity Investor

Työ tutkii yritysportaalin roolia organisaation tietojohtamisessa. Tutkimusongelman ratkaisemiseksi luodaan viitekehys, jossa yritysportaalin ja tietojohtamisen teoriat linkittyvät. Työn empiirisessä osassa viitekehys on pohjana case-yritykselle rakennettavalle yritysportaalille. Laadullinen tutkimus käsittää teoriaosuuden sekä osallistuvaan case-tutkimukseen perustuvan empiriaosuuden. Työn runko muodostuu kahden vastakkaisen tietojohtamisajattelun vuoropuhelusta, jotka ovat informaatioteknologiaan- ja strategiseen johtamiseen perustuvat näkökulmat. Toimivan tietojohtamismallin täytyy sisältää molemmat aspektit. Jokainen organisaatio tarvitsee informaation hallintaan liittyviä toiminnallisuuksia ja täten eksplisiittisen tiedon hallinta tietojärjestelmien avulla on onnistuneen tietojohtamisen kulmakiviä. Tätä perusinfrastruktuuria on mahdollista laajentaa hiljaisen tiedon hallintaan perustuvilla tietojohtamismenetelmillä. Työn ratkaisu näiden kahden näkemyksen, 'kovan' informaatioteknogiaan painottuvan sekä 'pehmeän' ihmisnäkökulman integrointiin, on yritysportaali. Työssä käytettävä yritysportaalin viitekehys rakentuu kolmeen päätoiminnallisuuteen; sisällönhallintaan, yhteistyöominaisuuksiin ja liiketoimintatiedon hallintaan. Työ todistaa yhteyden viitekehyksen sekä tietojohtamisen perusmallien, kuten tietojohtamisen prosessimallin sekä tietoympäristöjen välillä. Yritysportaali voi täten toimia, ei ainoastaan yksittäisten tietojohtamistyökalujen implementoinnissa, vaan tietojohtamisstrategian luomisen apuna tarjoten alustan tai 'katalyytin' kokonaisvaltaiselle tietojohtamiselle.

Managing Brand Equity over Time

The main concept of this paper is managing brand equity over time. In the theoretical section, a necessary basis for managing brand equity is first built by reviewing the most important themes related to branding. After this the concept of brand equity is discussed thoroughly, and a framework is built for managing brand equity over time. The empirical section illustrates how the case company, Masku, has built its brand equity over the history of the company. What can be derived from this research is that the process of managing brand equity over time can be an implicit process, and means of reinforcing the brand are often used without specific emphasis to generate business.

Measuring Brand Equity and Analyzing Its Relationship with Key Marketing Mix Elements

The aim of this paper is to analyze the effect of price and advertising on brand equity. The dimensionality of brand equity is thoroughly examined, and the effect price, price deals, perceived advertising spending and advertising appeal have on the dimensions of brand equity are analyzed using multiple regression analysis as well as other supporting analyses. Price and advertising are found to be of great importance to brand equity. Arguably the most influential finding is the strong positive effect low prices – an integral brand element – have on the case company brand equity, even though a negative effect was hypothesized based on prior research. The results also support separating advertising appeal from perceived advertising spending, as well as linking service quality as part of the overall perceived quality in the context of service-intensive firms.

The effects of derivative use on equity fund performance

Investing in mutual funds has become more popular than ever and the amount of money invested in mutual funds registered in Finland has hit its all-time high. Mutual funds provide a relatively low-cost method for private investors to invest in stock market and achieve diversified portfolios. In finance there is always a tradeoff between risk and return, where higher expected returns can usually be achieved only by taking higher risks. Diversifying the portfolio gets rid some of the risk but systematic risk cannot be diversified away. These risks can be managed by hedging the investments with derivatives. The use of derivatives should improve the performance of the portfolios using them compared to the funds that don’t. However, previous studies have shown that the risk exposure and return performance of derivative users does not considerably differ from nonusers. The purpose of this study is to examine how the use of derivatives affects the performance of equity funds. The funds studied were 155 equity funds registered in Finland in 2013. Empirical research was done by studying the derivative use of the funds during a 6-year period between 2008–2013. The performance of the funds was studied quantitatively by using several different performance measures used in mutual fund industry; Sharpe Ratio, Treynor Ratio, Jensen's alpha, Sortino Ratio, M2 and Omega Ratio. The effect of derivative use on funds' performance was studied by using a dummy variable and comparing performance measures of derivative-users and nonusers. The differences in performance measures between the two groups were analyzed with statistical tests. The hypothesis was that funds' derivative use should improve their performance relative to the funds that don't use them. The results of this study are in line with previous studies that state that the use of derivatives does not improve mutual funds' performance. When performance was measured with Jensen's alpha, funds that did not use derivatives performed better than the ones that used them. When measured with other performance measures, the results didn’t differ between two groups.

THE COSTS OF RAISING EQUITY RATIO FOR BANKS Evidence from publicly listed banks operating in Finland

The solvency rate of banks differs from the other corporations. The equity rate of a bank is lower than it is in corporations of other field of business. However, functional banking industry has huge impact on the whole society. The equity rate of a bank needs to be higher because that makes the banking industry more stable as the probability of the banks going under will decrease. If a bank goes belly up, the government will be compensating the deposits since it has granted the bank’s depositors a deposit insurance. This means that the payment comes from the tax payers in the last resort. Economic conversation has long concentrated on the costs of raising equity ratio. It has been a common belief that raising equity ratio also increases the banks’ funding costs in the same phase and these costs will be redistributed to the banks customers as higher service charges. Regardless of the common belief, the actual reaction of the funding costs to the higher equity ratio has been studied only a little in Europe and no study has been constructed in Finland. Before it can be calculated whether the higher stability of the banking industry that is caused by the raise in equity levels compensates the extra costs in funding costs, it must be calculated how much the actual increase in the funding costs is. Currently the banking industry is controlled by complex and heavy regulation. To maintain such a complex system inflicts major costs in itself. This research leans on the Modigliani and Miller theory, which shows that the finance structure of a firm is irrelevant to their funding costs. In addition, this research follows the calculations of Miller, Yang ja Marcheggianon (2012) and Vale (2011) where they calculate the funding costs after the doubling of specific banks’ equity ratios. The Finnish banks studied in this research are Nordea and Danske Bank because they are the two largest banks operating in Finland and they both also have the right company form to able the calculations. To calculate the costs of halving their leverages this study used the Capital Asset Pricing Model. The halving of the leverage of Danske Bank raised its funding costs for 16—257 basis points depending on the method of assessment. For Nordea the increase in funding costs was 11—186 basis points when its leverage was halved. On the behalf of the results found in this study it can be said that the doubling of an equity ratio does not increase the funding costs of a bank one by one. Actually the increase is quite modest. More solvent banks would increase the stability of the banking industry enormously while the increase in funding costs is low. If the costs of bank regulation exceeds the increase in funding costs after the higher equity ratio, it can be thought that this is the better way of stabilizing the banking industry rather than heavy regulation.

THE COSTS OF RAISING EQUITY RATIO FOR BANKS Evidence from publicly listed banks operating in Finland

The solvency rate of banks differs from the other corporations. The equity rate of a bank is lower than it is in corporations of other field of business. However, functional banking industry has huge impact on the whole society. The equity rate of a bank needs to be higher because that makes the banking industry more stable as the probability of the banks going under will decrease. If a bank goes belly up, the government will be compensating the deposits since it has granted the bank’s depositors a deposit insurance. This means that the payment comes from the tax payers in the last resort. Economic conversation has long concentrated on the costs of raising equity ratio. It has been a common belief that raising equity ratio also increases the banks’ funding costs in the same phase and these costs will be redistributed to the banks customers as higher service charges. Regardless of the common belief, the actual reaction of the funding costs to the higher equity ratio has been studied only a little in Europe and no study has been constructed in Finland. Before it can be calculated whether the higher stability of the banking industry that is caused by the raise in equity levels compensates the extra costs in funding costs, it must be calculated how much the actual increase in the funding costs is. Currently the banking industry is controlled by complex and heavy regulation. To maintain such a complex system inflicts major costs in itself. This research leans on the Modigliani and Miller theory, which shows that the finance structure of a firm is irrelevant to their funding costs. In addition, this research follows the calculations of Miller, Yang ja Marcheggianon (2012) and Vale (2011) where they calculate the funding costs after the doubling of specific banks’ equity ratios. The Finnish banks studied in this research are Nordea and Danske Bank because they are the two largest banks operating in Finland and they both also have the right company form to able the calculations. To calculate the costs of halving their leverages this study used the Capital Asset Pricing Model. The halving of the leverage of Danske Bank raised its funding costs for 16—257 basis points depending on the method of assessment. For Nordea the increase in funding costs was 11—186 basis points when its leverage was halved. On the behalf of the results found in this study it can be said that the doubling of an equity ratio does not increase the funding costs of a bank one by one. Actually the increase is quite modest. More solvent banks would increase the stability of the banking industry enormously while the increase in funding costs is low. If the costs of bank regulation exceeds the increase in funding costs after the higher equity ratio, it can be thought that this is the better way of stabilizing the banking industry rather than heavy regulation.