Free ACCA & CIMA online courses from OpenTuition

Free Notes, Lectures, Tests and Forums for ACCA and CIMA exams

20% off ACCA & CIMA Books

OpenTuition recommends the new interactive BPP books for March and June 2025 exams.
Get your discount code >>

Reader Interactions

Comments

  2. In the lecture you used 100 equity +40 debt =140 for P and 100 equity +20debt =120 for Q. You found P to be more risky with P Asset Beta=1.4 and Q Asset Beta=1.3

    I used 60+40=100 for P and 80+20=100 for Q.
    I found Q to be more risky. P Asset Beta=1.23 and Q Asset Beta=1.27

  3. Hello sir,
    Could you please explain what you mean when at the end of the lecture you say regarding eg 11- if we are changing gearing and the level of risk is changing,we cant use weighted average. I dont understand why not because from what i understood in the previous lecture is that when we combine investments, the overall beta will be the weighted average of the individual betas. I must be missing sth out here..so will be grateful for your clarification. Thanks

    • The fact that the overall beta is the weighted average of the individual betas is of no relevance to this.
      If the gearing changes then the WACC will change (that is M&M) and if the overall level of risk changes then so will the WACC.
      It may help you to watch the Paper F9 lecture on ‘when and when not to use the WACC’.

  4. Respected sir,
    Borrowing 950
    Share capita 500
    Reserves 400
    Company want to raise finance 250
    acquired Comapny value 270
    What is gearing after acquisition?

    • We don’t “upgear”!

      The beta of a share measures the risk of a share and part of the risk is due to the gearing. If we want to measure the risk of the actual business then we need to remove the affect of the gearing and calculate what the beta would be without gearing.

      This is all explained in the lectures on CAPM. (I assume that you have watched all the earlier ones?)
      If you still have problems with the idea then watch also the Paper F9 lectures on CAPM (because this is revision of F9)

  6. Sir,

    do I understand correctly that greater gearing increases systematic risk and therefore beta is increasing as well?

    So greater the gearing >>>> greater systematic risk of a stock >>>> greater Beta >>>>>> greater Ke >>>>>> Greater WACC >>>>>> lower value of a company?

    Is It also depends when WACC will increase due to gaering in accordance with MM and traditional theory as there are also capital structure issues?

    • One more question Sir,

      Increased gearing implies increased Vd >>>>>>>> Vd makes greater Beta Equity >>>>>>>> Greater Beta Equity makes greater WACC >>>>>>> once WACC is greater Ve is lower (in accourdance with say discounted FCF model)

      My question is:
      Once Ve became lower (and gearing has changed again) should we recalculate Beta Equity again? If it is the case it is becoming endless circle… How should we deal with that issue?

      • and where do we get Ve initially if the company is unquoted?

        Sorry that I ask a lot of question if they are irrelevant or out of P4 scope may be there is no need to answer them…

    • More gearing increases the beta of the share and therefore increases the cost of equity.

      However this does not mean that the WACC will increase because more gearing also means more debt and the cost of debt is lower than the cost of equity. As you will remember from earlier lectures, according to M&M with tax, the WACC will fall with higher gearing.

      • If the company is unquoted then certainly we do not know Ve.
        In an exam you will either have to be given a value or given the gearing ratio.
        (We can however find the asset beta by taking a similar quoted company and angering their equity beta using their gearing)

      • Thank you sir, now rewatching F9 lecture relating to MM and capital structure.

        For those who not sure regarding effect of gearing I recommend to watch this lecture regarding MM and Traditional gearing theory first…

        https://opentuition.com/acca/f9/the-cost-of-capital-the-effect-of-changes-in-gearing/

        but anyway I want to confirm my understanding:

        Beta = Standard deviation of systematic risk of a company/ Standard deviation of systematic risk of a Market.

        We assume that systematic risk of a Market is fixed. So beta can be greater only in case if systematic risk of a company is greater. Once gearing increases Beta does it imply increasing in systematic risk? Otherwise how can we make beta greater due to gearing in accordance with above formula?

  7. Hi Sir

    Just a bit confused. “published betas are betas of a share”. Does betas of a share mean Equity beta?

    Equity betas are betas showing the gearing effect along with the systematic risk of a share. And to show the business risk only, which is systematic risk, the equity beta needs to be ungeared ( which is the asset beta). Am I right?

      • Ok thanks……….but re-gear using the company’s capital structure / the project intended capital structure?

        Also,this lecture was able to break down the essence of ungearing.please can you help me out with the simplistic reason for re-gearing?

      • We ungear a similar company to find the riskiness of the business and therefore the project (the asset beta).

        To appraise the project we also need to take into account the gearing of the project (because the gearing in the project will make the equity more risky), so we need to regear the beta to get the equity beta.

        If it is a normal NPV question, then we need to discount at the WACC. We usually assume that the gearing of the project will be the same as that currently existing in the company, so you regear the beta to get the equity beta. Use this to get the cost of equity. Then calculate a WACC for the project in the normal way.

        If you are being asked for the APV, then regearing is not relevant (because the base case NPV assumes all equity and we are dealing with the gearing separately).

        I hope that all makes sense 馃檪

Leave a Reply