Mdcc Track And How You Could Have A Better Health Essays

Mdcc Track And How You Could Have A Better Health Consider how likely you would be to agree if one offers you the opportunity to better your health and your physique while at the same time getting rid of the everyday stresses. I once read that for college students, minor hassles, rather than major life events tend to maintain stress at unhealthy levels. But exercise is one of the essential elements to help lower stress. In an effort to help students, and teachers, to lower stress levels, I analyzed the ambiance found at Miami Dade South track facility. MDCC track offers a 400 meters facility with seating capacity for about 450 people (in permanent concrete bleachers) and additional temporary bleachers suited for 200 more. The track is located behind the pool (building 7000) and between the baseball and soccer fields. The track is made out of red clay, consists of eight lanes clearly separated by white lines, and painted with their respective numbers. The hours of operation of the track are from Monday thru Friday 7:00 to 2:30 PM and 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM; Saturdays from 9:00 am to 4:00 PM and Sundays is closed. Advantages of working out at the MDCC track are that the track is well lit and the students can go right after classes. In the middle of the track there is a well-trimmed grass area that can be utilized while warming up or cooling down. It is favorably recommended for any MDCC student to make use of the campus facilities, especially the track. Not only one will get natural stress reduction while jogging running for walking, but it is also free. In order to enjoy. MDCC track and avoid potential for injury here is a small list to utilize in order to get better results: 1) Start out by wearing comfortable shoes 2) Drink plenty of water throughout the day and try to eat healthy 3) Warm up for at least 10 minutes before starting your exercise (running, jogging or walking); make sure you give your muscles a good stretch without over exhaustion. 4) Start your exercise (run, jog or walk) and continue it for at least 15 minutes. Enjoy the view at MDCC. Look at the people around you and try to get pepped-up. 5) Finish your exercise by cooling down for at least 5 minutes in the same way you did your warm-up. I am by no means a true expert on fitness and health but I am giving a fist hand account of what turns out to be a very relaxing experience at the track of Miami Dade. I hope you can enjoy it too! Sports and Games

Free Essays on The Tyger

are so distinguishable from the non-rhyming wor... Free Essays on The Tyger Free Essays on The Tyger â€Å"The Tyger†, by William Blake, is a compelling piece of literature which is very ambiguous and vague. Many different interpreters have very dissimilar opinions not only of the poem itself, but of its deeper meaning. Algernon Charles Swinburne asks, â€Å"Could God bring down his heart to the making of a thing so deadly and strong? Or could any lesser daemonic force of nature take to itself wings and fly high enough to assume power equal to such a creation?† In the poem itself, Blake asks the tiger, â€Å"Did he who made the Lamb make thee?† The central question seems to be whether the tiger, a fearful and wrathful creature, was created by the grace of God or the iniquity of Satan. Of course the tiger was created by God, for it was He who created Heaven and Earth. Therefore, as abominable as the tiger may be, it inevitably has to be a production of God. Apparently over time the tiger has been transformed into this malicious creature. Is it not true t hat people are a product of their environment? The same case applies to the tiger. It has been given the circumstances in which it must take on the role of savage beast to maintain its survival in the environment. The lamb, on the other hand, has been presented a lifestyle in which it must really do nothing to perpetuate its species. Therefore, the tiger appears sinful, whereas the lamb appears passive and innocent. However, both creatures are actually equal. The only difference is the conditions in which they are in as a species. God did not create an abominate creature; he created a creature which developed its own traits. Being a romantic poem, â€Å"The Tyger† has a much deeper meaning than just who created the tiger. Blake is trying to enlighten people as to the concept of transformation. Even though these two creatures were essentially created the same, they have transformed into two entirely opposite entities. One has transformed into good, and one evil. Pe ople ca... Free Essays on The Tyger â€Å"The Tyger† Does god create both gentle and fearful creatures? If he does what right does he have? Both of these rhetorical questions are asked by William Blake in his poem â€Å"The Tyger.† The poem takes the reader on a journey of faith, questioning god and his nature. The poem completes a cycle of questioning the creator of the tyger, discussing how it could have been created, and then returns to questioning the creator again. Both questions about the tyger’s creator are left unanswered. William Blake uses rhythm, rhyme, and poetic devices to create a unique effect and to parallel his theme in his work â€Å"The Tyger.† William Blake’s choice of rhythm is important to his poem â€Å"The Tyger† because it parallels the theme of the poem, that the tyger may have been made by god or another harsher creator. Most of the poem is written in trochaic tetrameter as can be seen in line three, when Blake says, â€Å"What immortal hand or eye.† This rhythm is very harsh sounding, exemplifying the very nature of the tyger. Some of the lines in the poem were written in iambic tetrameter, such as in line ten, when Blake says, â€Å"Could twist the sinews of thy heart? .† Iambic tetrameter has a much softer sounding beat than does trochaic tetrameter. This implies the gentle nature of god, and if he could create such a beast. The last word of each quatrain is written in a spondee. This helps to create a unique symmetry and to parallel the â€Å"fearful symmetry† of a tyger. William Blake’s use of rhyme greatly affects his work â€Å"The Tyger.† The entire poem is written in couplets. Couplets contain two lines, paralleling the dichotomy of the poem, that everything has two sides or parts. The rhyme scheme is AA BB CC etc. Because the rhyming words are so distinguishable from the non-rhyming wor...

Assignment #2 Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

#2 - Assignment Example One time when dad was the only one at home, I tried talking to him about my day. I had a really bad day but I don’t want to just blurt it out to him because to me, the feelings are painful and I want to be assured that I will be listened to. So I asked him how his day went. He replied with a brief story about what happened at the office. When he didn’t ask me, I tried asking him another set of questions and none of them seemed to give him the signal that it’s time for him to ask me. When I got upset, I told him, â€Å"Aren’t you even going to ask me about my day?† I felt really bad. But he apologized and said, â€Å"Sweetie, I didn’t even know you wanted to say something. You kept asking me. If you want to tell me about your day, go right ahead.† Only then did I realize that men don’t instinctively know this â€Å"non-spoken rule† among women. For them, if you ask a question, it is a message that you just want informatio n and not comforting. As it was pointed out by Maltz and Broker, one tendency of a woman when it comes to communication is to ask questions. (A Cultural Approach, 38) In my experience in that conversation with my dad, this proved to be true. I believe that this miscommunication was due to gender differences because whenever I ask my mom or my girlfriends about their day or feelings, they always return the question to me. We always ask each other questions but I don’t recall my dad or brother asking me. As it was explained in men’s features, men make more direct declarations of fact or opinion than do women. (A Cultural Approach, 38) When they want to say something, they don’t ask me first, they go right ahead. Another factor that may have affected the miscommunication in my example is sex role. As it was said in Explanations Offered, having been taught to speak and act like â€Å"ladies† women become as unassertive and insecure as they have been made to sound. (A Cultural Approach,

Freedom and emancipation of women Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Freedom and emancipation of women - Essay Example On the other hand, men were more flexible and could look for work and live away from homes, while still expecting to have their wives take care of their children at home. In Kate Chopin story â€Å"the story of an hour†, women are depicted as being oppressed, but repressing their feeling despite their desire for freedom. The theme of oppression of women in the society is best captured in the story of an hour where Mrs. Mallard; the main author who is depicted as having a heart trouble. This is the reason why the death of her husband is brought with gentleness (Chopin 788). This is a disease that Chopin refers to be the one of the causes of trouble facing Mrs. Ballard. In the story, the heart disease is a symbol of the pain that Chopin has to contend with, one that makes her sick and remain at home, while her husband goes to work. The interpretation of the heart diseases ties with the notion that women’s places was home and not in the industry, which was considered as a playing field for men only. This was a belief that men held during the nineteenth century, at a time when women were trying to liberate themselves from chains of having to take roles as wives at home. But as indicated in the story, the struggles of women like Mrs. Mallard bore no success as she succumbed to death because of her heart trouble. Mrs. Mallard is depicted as a young woman in the story and yet all she could do was stay at home, while the husband went to work to fend for the family. Chopin’s portrays Mrs. Mallard as a young woman who has a fair and calm face. These descriptions indicate the status of women in the society being that most of them had the potential to take over roles in the industries and other domains (Stein 54). Needless to say, the theme of oppressions seems to be overstretched on women like Mr. Mallard who have to wait at home for the husband to come home. In addition, it is clear to point that men made women hold gender roles at home advancing the theme of oppression. In what seems as a twist, Mr. Mallard later becomes happy because the death of her husband meant his freedom. In the story, Chopin describes Mrs. Mallard as having a dull stare, one that illustrates the kind of life she has gone through. The dull eyes present readers with the feeling of women have having been stagnated and withdrawn in the quest for freedom. This notion is true considering the fact that women during the 19th century continued to hold a role at home with none having the chance to take part in other facets of life. In the story, it is apparent that Mrs. Mallard is less independent in her marriage, which indicates the oppression that women were going through in their society. To a great extent, it can be argued that married women like Mrs. Mallard were less independent because of their allegiance to the will of their husbands. Historically, the women’s quest from freedom in the nineteenth century reflected the difficulty of women making sig nificant breakthroughs in a society where men were parochial. In another perspective, the dull stare reveal the routine that characterized the lives of women being that many of them stayed at home. This signifies a form of oppression that made women restricted to their homes rather than joint the social and economic life experienced by their male counterparts. To some degree, Chopin reveal that women despite being oppressed remained tied to their husbands to the chain of oppression tha

You could put any topic you think is necessary Essay

You could put any topic you think is necessary - Essay Example Capital punishment began as early as in the 14th century B. C. under the Hittite code. They were also in used by Romans in the 5th century B. C., in Athens under the Draconian code in the 7th century B. C. as well as in Babylon in the 18th century B. C. during the reign of King Hammurabi. Criminals were mostly burnt alive, beaten to death, crucified or beheaded. In Britain, the most commonly used methods for execution were hanging, boiling alive or beheading. In the 16th century A. D, more than 70,000 people were executed in the country during the time of Henry VIII. Crimes included theft, getting married to Jews, treason and many other crimes that added up to 222 by the 17th century A. D. In the mid 18th century A. D., the crimes that were punishable by death were reduced to 120 (Banner (2002). Many nations have abolished capital punishment, but some are still practicing it, with China leading the group of 58 countries, having executed 5000 capital offenders in 2008. Iran and Saudi Arabia were also ranked among the countries with the highest executions though they came after China by far at 348 and 102 respectively. In the United States, 37 offenders were executed. Japan, Indonesia, Libya, North Korea and Saudi Arabia are also applying capital punishment (Hands off Cain, 2008). Abolitionists are still campaigning against death penalty. Brown (2010) observes that the bible, which is used in many criminal justice systems for swearing convicts and witnesses has many verses such as â€Å"Genesis 9:5-6, Numbers 35:30, Num. 35:30 and Num. 35:33-34† among others that support death penalty for various crimes including murder, adultery and incest among others. There are offences in these passages that can only be punished through capital punishment. Some countries such as the US use these verses to justify the application of capital punishment. However, there are usually controversies concerning the sixth commandment that cautions against

The Stepping Stones of Labor in America Essay Example for Free

The Stepping Stones of Labor in America Essay Throughout time, in all places, there is an upper class and a lower class. During the 16th to 19th century in America people came from all over Europe. People from Europe found America as an escape from their life; a new start. Some could not afford to take a boat ride across the Atlantic with their whole family. Because of this, some people became indentured servants. Later on, the South revolutionized America by bringing in black slaves and getting rid of indentured servitude. Slaves generated the economy for the South, but was also the main cause of the civil war. Both slaves and indentured servants were treated badly, however, black slaves were much more expensive and had to work for life, whereas indentured servants worked for a reward. Both the indentured servants and black slaves did very similar agricultural work. They were treated dreadfully and were not able to change their employer. They didnt get to choose what labor they did and they were not able to own the product from their labor. Black slaves were captured in Africa and brought on boats to come to America. A lot of black slaves didnt make it to America because of sickness and diseases on the boat. Indentured servants were often forced to go with their owner or were kidnapped and put on ships, where the boats were unsanitary. During this time in America there was too much land for the amount of people so when they servants and slaves were brought over they had to sustain the crops and the fields. They worked long hours in the cold winters and in the brutal summer days in the fields. Both the indentured servants and black slaves were scarred mentally for being taken from their families and coming to a new land. They were physically beaten if they tried to escape or didnt do their work well. Sometimes they were beaten without a reason. Both groups were treated badly and couldnt do anything about it. Indentured servants had a certain amount of time they had to work to get a reward so they had more motivation for becoming free and had hope during tough times whereas black slaves were forced into labor for their whole life and didnt have any hope to escape. After the indentured servants had did their time depending how long their contract was, they were given money, land and often a sustainable job. Black slaves were permanently slaves and didnt have as much hope as indentured servants because they had no family and they knew that they were stuck living their life the way it was forever. Also, indentured servants often had learned some economically valuable skills, so when their contract was up, they were more prepared for the outside world, while black slaves were not usually and were not let out. Indentured servants were slaves and dehumanized during their time of their contract, but often had a better life because of what they learned from being a servant and their reward. While both slaves and servants typically did similar work, slaves were bought and put into work whereas indentured servants signed a contract and the owner didnt give up any money value until the end of contract. During this time the cost of a black slave was about 130,000 dollars. This was a lot higher because this is when there was no more indentured servitude and the Souths economy relied on black slaves for cotton. Paying 130,000 dollars for a slave seems like a bad investment, but they got the slaves for life and the slaves could reproduce and have more slaves in the future. The biggest reason why black slaves were a better investment was that they were permanent and were with the owner forever or could be sold whereas white servants were short term and had to give up land and money in the land. Indentured servants were like a loans; youd get them and at the end you would have to give up some money. Black slaves were worth so much more at the time then indenture servants and because of this indentured servants no longer existed. The ultimate purpose of slaves and indentured servants are identical, however, the conditions on which they worked was completely different. Slaves had no hope for any freedom unless they risked the danger of escaping while indentured servants would one day be free from their masters, once they fulfilled there contracts which stated how long they would work for. Slaves were worth a lot more money and helped generate the economy for the South. Eventually indentured servitude disappeared and slavery had become one of the biggest forms of labor in America. While indentured servitude had little impact in the making of America, slavery become one of the most controversial issues of the 1800s, and the issues over racial discrimination which had started in America in the 1600s, would continue on into the mid-twentieth century.

In What Ways Do You Think That The Dreams Of The Characters Are :: English Literature

In What Ways Do You Think That The Dreams Of The Characters Are Different From Reality And To What Extent Will They Be Fulfilled? The American Dream can be defined as the idea that America is the land of opportunity for everyone who is willing to work hard and persevere. It was seen as the land of freedom where everyone has a chance of "pursuit of happiness." The USA was seen as a place of equal opportunities for anyone, one of the reasons being that there was no class system like there were in Britain. Dramatic irony links in with this idea of the Wingfield family living in the middle of the American Dream. It involves us in the play but as it is a memory play, dramatic irony does not make us feel part of it. It reminds us that we are on the outside looking in and also that we live in a different time period than the one in which the play is set. We, as the audience have a great deal of insight into the play, and therefore we know that there is no real truth in the American Dream. It is just a myth because the play is set in the 1930's, which was the period of the Great Depression. The American economy had collapsed due to the Wall Street Crash, so it would have been virtually impossible for the American Dream to work for someone like Jim. Jim is Tennessee Williams' central focus point of all the characters' dreams as he is "the long delayed but always expected something" that the Wingfield family have been waiting for. He is the most significant character in the play who can be related to the American Dream. In the film version, Jim is portrayed as an ordinary man, which is disappointing for us as we find it impossible to believe that he is such a central character and that all the dreams of the Wingfields depend upon him. " Knowledge - Zzzzp! Money - Zzzzzp! - Power That's the cycle democracy is built on!" When he pitches this line to Laura, we wonder that how can a person who believes in this absurdity, be such a central character in the play if he is portrayed like this. The actor who plays Jim in the film makes him seem extremely stupid. The actor does not give the impression that Jim is very important and it does not emphasise the fact that he is such a major character, which is why I feel that the portrayal of Jim is unsuccessful. Jim strongly believes that he will be able to obtain an executive post

Ameritrade’s Cost of Capital Essay

Executive Summary After careful analysis of Ameritrade and comparable companies, I have estimated a 14.784% cost of capital that should be used to evaluate Ameritrade’s upcoming investments in technology and advertising. After analyzing the historical return on Ameritrade’s investments, I have concluded that if the firm manages this project at least as well as its previous investments, the return on the proposed project will exceed the cost of capital resulting in a positive NPV project. Based on the estimated cost of capital, relative to the company’s historical returns on investment, I recommend that Ameritrade undertakes this investment project. I believe that the estimated cost of capital is appropriate because it is partly based on a set of companies where the main source of revenue is similar to that of Ameritrade, deep discount brokerage companies. In addition, the nature of the project is to increase the customer base of Ameritrade, a frequent and archetypal venture for a deep-discount brokerage firm. Because Ameritrade has very limited data due to its recent IPO, I will be using the comparable data of Waterhouse Investors, Quick and Reilly Group Incorporated, and Charles Schwab Corporation to estimate Ameritrade’s levered beta using a bottom-up approach. I will be using these comparables because they are all characterized as deep-discount brokerage firms with similar sources of revenue. I used data from 1992-1996 because in my experience, I have found that five years of data provides a reasonable and precise measure of information. It should be noted that I consistently used the same amount of data from five calendar years for all of Ameritrade’s comparables. The key stakeholders involving this decision are management and those providing the capital, both debt and equity, for this new undertaking. For these stakeholders, priority lies in the return of the investment, the success of the company, and the ability to meet the financial obligations of the firm. These priorities can be best predicted with my provided estimation of the cost of capital in relation to the company’s historical return on investment. Market Overview As Ameritrade continues to grow and make investments in projects, it is important to realize the effect the market has on the brokerage. One thing I want to emphasize is the direct correlation between the deep discount brokerage market and the stock market. While the S&P 500 during the last two years (1995 and 1996) have had returns of 34.11% and 20.26% respectively, it is easy to be optimistic about the health of the economy and the performance of the company. In the case of an economic downturn, Ameritrade should be ready for a decrease in consumer activity and should consider diversification. Perhaps taking on other types of activities such as investment banking roles like mergers, acquisitions, and security underwritings would also be wise. This would diversify away some of the risk involved in strictly deep-discount brokers. Ameritrade should also be conscientious of the very price-sensitive nature of its consumers when evaluating this investment. My calculated cost of capital i s subject to a variety of factors affected by the uncertainty of the future. For instance, it is conceivable that the company’s beta will change over time due to the dynamic characteristics of the market and the economy. In addition, stakeholders could change their comfort regarding the degree of risk aversion, which would affect the market risk premium. In order to mitigate the risk, Ameritrade could place a premium cost of capital on top of my estimated cost of capital when discounting future cash flows. This would mitigate the risk of future cash flows that are too optimistic in potentially harsh economic times. I believe that this would be an appropriate way to help stakeholders feel more comfortable with investments, especially investments as large as this advertising and technology project. In order to estimate the cost of capital of Ameritrade, I had to determine standard parameters, such as beta, from comparable companies because of Ameritrade’s recent IPO and subsequent short track record of performance. I was able to obtain comparable companies’ betas by way of running a regression on the returns of the companies in relation to the return on the market, or the S&P 500. By applying Ameritrade’s capital structure to the comparable companies’ unlevered beta, I was able to approximate the beta of Ameritrade. I was subsequently able to estimate the cost of equity assuming the same capital structure prior to the prospective investment with the  Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM). I used CAPM to find the cost of equity for this particular project, not to evaluate the potential change in the process. The capital asset pricing model can be used in evaluation of the cost of capital because it reflects the reward for postponing consumption, the relative amount of systematic risk, and the reward in the market for bearing systematic risk. Thus I can estimate the cost of capital using the true systematic risk. I believe that in the future, a capital structure consisting of more debt may lower the weighted average cost of capital and keep a larger proportion of the benefits of the project to the current stakeholders, while keeping in mind that Ame ritrade should abstain from taking on too much debt considering its sensitivity to the market. I used three comparable companies to estimate Ameritrade’s cost of capital: Waterhouse Investors, Quick and Reilly Group Incorporated, and Charles Schwab Corporation. These deep-discount brokerage firms, along with Ameritrade, source most of their revenues through transactions and net interest. Situation Overview The WACC is a measurement of the riskiness of the firm as a whole and can be applied to standard company projects. Ameritrade has been first movers on introducing features such as an automated phone trading service and an online trading platform in the deep discount brokerage market. Both of these investments are characterized by substantial investments in technology, as is the proposed project. Based on this, I consider the stated project as a typical project of the firm, yielding an average risk equal to that of Ameritrade’s nature. Therefore, I find that evaluating the stated project with WACC as a hurdle rate of whether to undertake the project is correct. One of the parameters that has a large effect on WACC is the capital structure applied in the calculations. In my calculations of the WACC of 14.783%, I assumed a debt to equity ratio of 0.261. I based this on the balance sheet numbers you provided me with for the two available years; it is a weighted? average of the two years of data. When looking to the market comparables Quick and Reilly Group Incorporated and Charles Schwab Corporation, one can see that the debt to equity ratio of Ameritrade is an industry standard. I decided to omit Waterhouse Investors for this comparison because of their atypical capital structure. In the calculation  of the WACC, debt has the advantage that it brings a tax shield since interest on debt is tax deductible. Therefore taking on more debt relative to equity can be profitable to a certain point where, cost of potential financial distress for undertaking that extra debt is less than the value of the interest tax shield. In addition, taking on too much debt carries the risk of major credit rating agencies downgrading the company, where eventually, debt becomes too costly because the cost of potential financial distress is greater than the value of the interest tax shield. Therefore, the management in the evaluation of the investment must have a clear focus on which capital structure is the optimal for Ameritrade in the future. Below I have done a sensitivity analysis of the WACC that should be applied in the evaluation of the investment project in relation to the capital structure. D% – E% 10/90 20/80 30/70 40/60 WACC 14.54% 14.32% 14.11% 13.89% Based on these calculations, I would recommend that management look into the optimal capital structure after the proposed investment. While keeping in mind the disadvantages of taking on too much debt, I would recommend a higher, though incremental, debt to equity ratio. I found Ameritrade’s after-tax cost of debt to be 7.28%. To find Ameritrade’s after-tax cost of debt, I collected the credit rating of Ameritrade’s outstanding debt through Standard & Poor’s credit rating agency. Ameritrade’s debt is currently rated at B+. The default spread on B+ corporate debt is listed at 5.01 on 10-year debt obligations. To find the cost of debt you add this number to the risk-free rate, which as of August 1997 is 6.69%, and multiply that number by 1 subtracted by the corporate tax rate of Ameritrade. The corporate tax rate of Ameritrade I found to be 37.7%, by averaging Ameritrade’s tax rates  over the two available years. It should be noted that the default-spread rate applied in my calculations are projected rates, not current rates (2014). The risk free rate of applied throughout my calculations is the annualized yield to maturity of a 20-year government T-bond has and has a yield of 6.69%. I have chosen to use this because I consider the proposed investment project a long-term investment. When choosing the risk-free rate, there can be no uncertainty about reinvestment rates in the calculations, meaning that one should use a zero-coupon bond with the same maturity as the project. The Market risk premium is defined as the difference between the expected return on the market portfolio and the risk-free rate; in other words, it is the compensation that risk adverse investors need to receive in order to invest in the market portfolio. I calculated the current market risk premium by finding the geometric average of the return on the market subtracted by a 20-year government T-Bond. I used the geometric average because we are valuing the average over a long period of time and the arithmetic average tends to overestimate the value. I then found the beta by using a bottom-up analysis. The bottom-up approach tends to make the standard error of the beta much lower than other types of analyses. In addition, the bottom-up approach can reflect the current and the expected future beta of the company. I looked at the beta of the comparable companies and found the average of the betas over the 1992-1996-time period. I then had to un-lever the beta and then re-lever the beta by Ameritrade’s capital structure to find Ameritrade’s levered beta. By using this beta, I was able to calculate Ameritrade’s cost of equity to be 16.06% by using the Capital Asset Pricing Model. In terms of the size of the investment, increasing advertising expenses to $155 million and technology expenses to $100 million is a huge undertaking for Ameritrade. If you look at your total assets at the end of 1996, you will see that it values at a little more than $400 million. Thus, the investments of this project would be 64% of Ameritrade’s total assets. When looking at the comparable companies Schwab, Quick and Reilly, and Waterhouse, a similar investment would only be 2%, 6%, and 21% of their total assets respectively. Because the investment is so large for Ameritrade, in comparison to its competitors, Ameritrade should be conscientious of the enormity of the project and require a higher proportional return. After consulting the database of Bloomberg Financial  Records, I found that your return on assets and return on equity exceeded my estimated weighted cost of capital. Thus, I conclude that Ameritrade undertakes this project with full-invested confidence in the m anagement. Conclusion My extensive research on Ameritrade and its comparable companies yielded an estimated 14.784% cost of capital for this project. Because of the nature of the proposed investment, I decided that the WACC would be applicable to the project. While this project may require a significant amount of resources, an optimistic return like the one you proposed and the historical average of your return on assets and equity would more than make up for the costs. Therefore my recommendation based on my calculations is that this is an attractive investment opportunity for Ameritrade, to grow its customer base and revenue, which the management should accept. However it must be taken into account that the beta and thereby the cost of equity I used to calculate the cost of capital were influenced by the comparable companies because I used data of these companies in my estimation of Ameritrade’s beta. Further the beta is estimated on historical return and not the future return. Consumer preferenc es and market conditions may lead to a change in Ameritrade’s beta over the projects lifetime. Since the future is unknown estimating a historical beta is the best guess of what the future beta will be. The market risk premium that I have applied in my calculations is also a subject to the changes of the future. The market risk premium is the compensation a risk adverse investor needs in order to invest. In periods of economic and financial depression, this market risk premium will increase resulting in a higher cost of capital. On the other hand, periods with good economic and financial conditions will lower the market risk premium. Further the market risk premium applied in my calculation is based on a projected default spread (2014) instead of the actual spread in 1996; this may be a source of variability. The capital structure of Ameritrade has a substantial effect on the cost of capital. In my calculations, I have applied the historical capital structure of Ameritrade. Increasing Ameritrade’s debt to equity ratio can bring down Ameritrade’s cost of capital. Therefore it would be in Ameritrade’s management best interest to look at the company’s future capital structure prior to this investment.  Ameritrade’s management should also look into the projected revenues of the investment. With projections ranging from 10% to 50%, only the most pessimistic forecasts are lower than the cost of capital of the project. However by cutting the transaction fees and thereby relying on a higher volume of executed trades can make Ameritrade even more susceptible to future economic depressions. As per my calculation, the size of the investment is proportionally large and must be treated in the most delicate manner. Ultimately, I suggest that management find the optimal capital structure before investing in this project. However, I do believe that with my calculated cost of capital in comparison to the average return on equity and return on assets, the investment will be a worthy venture.

Paralleles of Cosi and Cosi Fan Tutte Essay

Cosi by Louis Nowra and Cosi Fan Tutte by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart are set in completely different times but both themes of the play parallel each other. Cosi was set in 1970’s society whilst Cosi Fan Tutte was set in 1790. Cosi Fan Tutte is play about love and fidelity which parallels with what happens in Cosi. On the surface they are parallel because Lucy is unfaithful to Lewis when they are in a relationship together just as the women were in Cosi Fan Tutte. But it is much more than that. To really understand the parallels of the plays we must look at love and fidelity in depth. What really is love? What is demonstrated throughout both plays is that people have double standards towards love. In the Cosi we see free love and characters that believe in free love such as Lucy, Nick and Doug. Free love is the belief of having sexual relations according to choice, without being restricted by marriage or long-term relationships. They believe in freedom in doing whatever you want but this is the complete opposite of how they treat the mentally ill. They treat them with not dignity that makes them restricted to being behind walls of an asylum. Free love is about freedom yet they are confined to their ward like traditional marriage because people fear them. This is not the definition of love. Louis Nowra wants us to love each other and not stereotyping people by giving labels to people that we fear but instead showing respect and compassion. That is what true love is. In Cosi Fan Tutte we see two men test the love and fidelity of their girlfriends. This displays the double standards that men have on love. They believe that is alright to for them to test love. Mozart tells us that love needs to be equal that one side can’t unfaithful and that is alright. Mozart is trying to make us question what love is, like Louis Nowra did in Cosi. For there to be love, it must be equal and this is the key theme from bo th plays.

How Much Advice Should You Give Away For Free With Matt Snodgrass

How Much Advice Should You Give Away For Free With Matt Snodgrass How much should you give away for free? Should you solve every problem for your audience, even when they do not buy your product or service? Determining how much content to give out for free can be challenging. Whether it is free or fee-based, make sure your content is valuable and helpful to users. Today, we’re talking to Matt Snodgrass, Director of Marketing at MarketingProfs which is all about learning. Whether it is for blogs, podcasts, or seminars, learn how to attract amazingly talented subject matter experts (SMEs) that contribute content to your business. Discover how to plan themes and content months in advance. Join us for a pack of actionable takeaways! Some of the highlights of the show include: When it comes to marketing, you may play many roles and do a little bit of everything. MarketingProfs focus on various types of content because people respond differently to types of content, depending on whether they prefer to read, watch, or listen to content. Developing a process for prioritizing content to educate others and identifying SMEs/potential influencers and topics you need to focus on to guide your business. Make different types of content available on-demand. Let the users learn on their schedule. Compile a backlog of content, so you can tailor and customize it to some degree. For example, you can have one month focus on one topic, and then the next month, focus on a different topic. MarketingProfs’ product is content. Courses, Webinars, seminars everything the company does revolves around content. It can be difficult to determine how much content to give away for free. MarketingProfs’ Website contains mostly free content. But for a fee, users can subscribe to additional in-depth content. Avoid junk by making sure the content you offer has value. Convey the principles of good marketing. Learn how to become an authority for your niche by not being afraid. Let go of worrying that people do not care about what you have to say. Powered by PodcastMotor Actionable Content Marketing powered by By AMP073: Matt Snodgrass How Much Advice Should You Give Away For Free? With Matt Snodgrass From MarketingProfs 00:00/00:00 1x 100 > Download file Subscribe on iTunes Leave Review Share Links:   HubSpot   iTunes review and email to podcast@.com If you liked today’s show, please subscribe on iTunes to The Actionable Content Marketing Podcast! The podcast is also available on SoundCloud, Stitcher, and Google Play. Quotes by Matt: â€Å"Our goal here is to help people learn and, in the end, to create smarter marketers.† â€Å"We know that for each person, there’s going to be a different way of learning that works best for them.† â€Å"We believe in our heart of hearts that learning is transformative. We know learning can change lives. Honestly, learning has the power to change the world.† â€Å"Learning really can change you as a marketer, can change your role in your company, can change you as a person.†

Strategic Alliances Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Strategic Alliances - Essay Example Risk taking is ubiquitous feature among the organizational managers these days. Strategic alliance is a kind of concept in which risk is an integral factor while developing such decisions. Strategic Alliance is an â€Å"an agreement between firms to do business together in ways that go beyond normal company–to–company dealings , but fall short of a merger or a full partnership† (Khurana & Singhal 2010). Any business decision involves planning and there is always a threat of failure of the plan. The move taken even after knowing the risks and evaluating their effects can be termed as risk. Similarly, strategic alliance is a kind of business decision which would involve amalgamation with outside companies not on a full partnership basis but a little different from daily intercompany dealings (Das & Teng, 1999). There may be a number of situations at risk as a result of the strategic alliance between two companies. The performance of the partner company, cooperation among the companies and the opportunistic approach of the companies involved among others could be the probable circumstances rendering risk to the decision in practice (Alders, Van Liere, Berendsen, & Pieters 2010). However, largely the risk situations can be categorized into four categories namely; the contextual risk, the transactional risk, the relational risk, and the performance risk. The contextual risk involves the risk influenced by the market scenario like meeting of the demand in the market, the competition faced by the company and also the technological and the regulatory influences. Thus, this can be also referred to as the external risk (Alders, Van Liere, Berendsen, & Pieters 2010). The transactional risk involves the importance of cooperation between the partners involved in the alliance. A proper cooperation and sharing of mutual trust can pay off to minimize risk to a great extent. Therefore, this may be referred as internal risk (Alders, Van Liere, Berendsen, & Pieters

Critical Infrastructure Protection Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Critical Infrastructure Protection - Essay Example c. Responsibilities-This particular unit performs various responsibilities pertaining to cross sector leadership and overarching leadership. The unit is also responsible for addressing all those broad complexities in relation to the federal system of the government (GAO, 2011; Homeland Security, 2009). 2. Explain what Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) initiatives are, what are protected, and the methods used to protect our assets CIP is referred to as a concept which signifies the responses that are made to tackle serious incidents involving the critical infrastructure in a particular region. In the concerned article of Government Accountability Office (GAO), CIP initiatives are: all round cyber security guidance in seven most vital sectors i.e. material, nuclear reactors, banking and finance, health care, information technology, water and solid wastes. The broad initiatives being rendered by CIP are specifically meant for protecting the above mentioned broad sectors. The meth ods used for protecting the assets included unique operations that mainly consisted of risk alterations (GAO, 2011; Homeland Security, 2009). 3. ... critical infrastructure. In relation to maintenance of critical infrastructure, the IS professionals need to consider the aspects of cyber security to a very large extent. Ensuring cyber security requirement of high level of technical knowhow inculcates accelerated level of critical thinking for analyzing the broad aspects of cyber security. The online atmosphere also consists of numerous amounts of hackers and malicious users who perform different illicit and unauthenticated activities in the web. They are also responsible for misinterpretation of facts and figures and gathers authenticated and restrictive information for the sole purpose of misuse. IS professional need to be well aware of such entities (GAO, 2011; Homeland Security, 2009). 4. Evaluate the Effectiveness of IS Professionals In Regard To Protecting the U.S.’S Critical Infrastructure The contributions of IS professionals in relation to protection of U.S.’s critical infrastructure is ideal in the context o f infrastructural development. The IS professional have greatly utilized the broad aspects of cyber security guidance in an in depth manner. This concept has been utilized not only in national but also in the international context, which is one of the broadest contributions that is served from the part of the IS professionals. In addition, they are also serving various purposes pertaining to the factors associated with improving the current Federal system in the U.S. All the activities reflecting from the parts of IS professionals aimed at a particular objective i.e. diversification of the infrastructural facilities and improving it thereby. The IS professionals are also responsible for improving the federal information systems, which is being carried out in alliance with National