Group Assignment Assessment Details and Submission Guidelines Assessment Details Details Trimester T1 2026 Unit Code HM5002 Unit Title Finance for Managers Assessment Type Individual Assignment Weight 40% Submission Guidelines All work must be submitted on Blackboard by the due date along with a completed Assignment Cover Page. The assignment must be in MS Word format unless otherwise specified. Academic Integrity Information Holmes Institute is committed to ensuring and upholding academic integrity. All assessments must comply with academic integrity guidelines. Please learn about academic integrity and consult your teachers with any questions. Violating academic integrity is serious and punishable by penalties that range from deduction of marks, failure of the assessment task or unit involved, suspension of course enrolment, or cancellation of course enrolment. Penalties This assessment must be submitted on Blackboard by the due date and time, as late penalties apply (refer Student Handbook). Assessment submitted without a completed Assessment Cover Page will receive a 20% penalty. This assessment must be submitted in Microsoft Word format. Submissions which breach this requirement will receive a 20% penalty. A 20% penalty will be imposed for all single student (solo) group assessment submissions. Assessments submitted via a VPN will receive a 50% penalty. Assessment submitted via an overseas IP address is a direct breach of Holmes’ Student Academic Conduct and Integrity Policy. Reference sources must be cited using Holmes Institute Adapted Harvard Referencing method. Incorrect referencing will receive a 20% penalty. Group Assignment Guidelines and Specifications Part A — Statistical Analysis on Return, Risk and Correlation (20 Marks) You are employed as a financial analyst with the responsibility of conducting a comprehensive statistical analysis of investment performance across a selection of companies listed on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX). Your role involves evaluating key financial metrics, including returns, risk measures, and correlations, to generate meaningful insights that support investment decision-making.
The dataset containing the ASX-listed companies assigned to your group has been provided below. Using this dataset, you are required to apply appropriate statistical techniques to assess the performance and risk characteristics of each company.
Allocation of Companies Listed Companies (from ASX) Industry WDS: Woodside Energy Group Limited Energy STO: Santos Limited Energy NEU: Neuren Pharmaceuticals Limited Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology & Life Sciences TLX: Telix Pharmaceuticals Limited Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology & Life Sciences Requirements: I. Write an overview of your allocated companies, ensuring the following details are included:
a. Its principal business activities (main products or services) b. Total market capitalization (as of December 2024) c. Major company events in 2022–2024 which may have impacted its stock prices. (2 marks)
II. Statistical Analysis on Return, Risk and Correlation
Using the historical price data provided in a separate Excel spreadsheet, perform the following:
a) Calculate the monthly returns and complete the table below. If there are no return values, indicate them as N.A. (4 marks)
Month Company 1 (Name) Company 2 (Name) Company 3 (Name) Company 4 (Name) Jan-2022 Feb-2022 Mar-2022 etc….. b) Calculate the arithmetic mean and standard deviation of monthly return and comment on the risk and return behaviour of stocks. (4 marks)
Company 1 (Name) Company 2 (Name) Company 3 (Name) Company 4 (Name) Arithmetic Mean (%) Standard Deviation (%) c) Calculate the geometric mean of monthly return for each stock, and explain what these values indicate about companies’ returns. (3 marks)
Company 1 (Name) Company 2 (Name) Company 3 (Name) Company 4 (Name) Geometric Mean (%) d) Estimate the annual return for each company using the calculated average monthly return. (1 mark)
Company 1 (Name) Company 2 (Name) Company 3 (Name) Company 4 (Name) Annual Return (%) e) Calculate the holding period return for each stock. (1 mark)
Company 1 (Name) Company 2 (Name) Company 3 (Name) Company 4 (Name) Holding Period Return (%) f) Based on monthly returns, estimate and comment on these stocks’ correlations. (4 marks)
Please insert correlation matrix from your Excel output. The correlation matrix is obtained using CORREL(array1, array2) in Excel spreadsheet.
Note: Ensure that you attach the Excel file containing the price data and necessary calculations to your assignment submission. Assignments submitted without an attached Excel file will incur a 10% penalty.
Part B — Financial Ratio Analysis (13 Marks) In addition to conducting the statistical analysis on return, risk and correlation for the allocated companies using the historical prices in Part A, you are also required to perform a detailed financial ratio analysis. This analysis should complement the findings from Part A by offering deeper insights into each company’s financial performance, and overall market positioning.
Requirements:
Obtain and review the Balance Sheet and Income Statement for each of your assigned companies for three financial years (FY2022, FY2023 and FY2024). Attach these financial statements in the appendix of your report. Based on this information:
a) Evaluate each company’s liquidity position by calculating and analysing key liquidity ratios, such as the Current Ratio, Quick Ratio etc. for each of the three financial years. (3 marks)
Company 1 (Name) Company 2 (Name) Company 3 (Name) Company 4 (Name) 2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024 Ratio 1 Ratio 2 Etc.. b) Comment on whether the company appears to have sufficient short-term resources to meet its obligations. (3 marks)
c) Identify and explain two key leverage ratios that would be important to creditors and/or potential investors (e.g. Debt-to-Equity Ratio, Interest Coverage Ratio, etc). Calculate and interpret these ratios for each company for each of the three financial years. (4 marks)
Company 1 (Name) Company 2 (Name) Company 3 (Name) Company 4 (Name) 2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024 Ratio 1 Ratio 2 Etc.. d) Identify and explain two key financial ratios that would be important to shareholders and/or potential investors (e.g. Return on Equity, Earnings Per Share, etc). Calculate and interpret these ratios for each company for each of the three financial years. (4 marks)
Company 1 (Name) Company 2 (Name) Company 3 (Name) Company 4 (Name) 2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024 Ratio 1 Ratio 2 Etc.. Part C — Preparation of an Investment Proposal (7 Marks) Finally, you are required to develop a well-structured investment strategy proposal. In this proposal, you must select and recommend two out of the four allocated companies, ensuring that one company is chosen from each industry represented in your dataset.
Your recommendations should be clearly justified and grounded in the findings from your earlier analyses, including both the statistical evaluation (returns, risk, and correlation) and the financial ratio assessment. You are expected to integrate these insights to explain why the selected companies offer stronger investment potential, considering factors such as performance consistency, risk profile, growth prospects, and competitive positioning within their respective industries.
Assignment Structure The assignment should include the following components:
The assignment cover page (group members’ names, student numbers, and all other required details) Abstract (one paragraph) Table of contents A brief introduction or overview of what the assignment is about Body of the assignment with appropriate section headings Conclusion List of References (follow the Holmes Adapted Harvard Referencing guidelines) Marking Criteria Marking Criteria Weighting Part A: Risk, Return and Correlation Analysis Overview of companies 2 II. a) Calculation of monthly return 4 Calculation of arithmetic mean and standard deviation of monthly return 4 Calculation of geometric mean of monthly return and explain what these values indicate about the companies’ returns 3 Estimation of annual return 1 Estimation of holding period return 1 Correlation analysis 4 Part B: Financial Ratio Analysis a) & b) Liquidity analysis 6 c) Leverage ratio analysis 4 d) Profitability and market value ratio analysis 4 Part C: Investment Proposal 7 Total 40 Student Assessment Citation and Referencing Rules Holmes has implemented a revised Harvard approach to referencing. The following rules apply:
Reference sources in assignments are limited to sources that provide full-text access to the source’s content for lecturers and markers. The reference list must be located on a separate page at the end of the report and titled: “References”. The reference list must include the details of all the in-text citations, arranged A-Z alphabetically by author surname with each reference numbered and each reference MUST include a hyperlink to the full text of the cited reference source. For example: Hawking, P., McCarthy, B. & Stein, A. 2004. Second Wave ERP Education, Journal of Information Systems Education, Fall, http://jise.org/Volume15/n3/JISEv15n3p327.pdf All assignments must include in-text citations. These must include the surname of the author/s or name of the authoring body, year of publication, page number of the content, and paragraph where the content can be found. For example: “The company decided to implement an enterprise-wide data warehouse business intelligence strategy (Hawking et al., 2004, p3(4)).” Non-Adherence to Referencing Rules For students who submit assignments that do not comply with all aspects of the rules, a 20% penalty will be applied. Late penalties will apply each day after the student/s have been notified of the due date. Students who comply with rules BUT their citations are ‘fake’ will be reported for academic misconduct. Academic Integrity Holmes Institute is committed to ensuring and upholding academic integrity, as it is integral to maintaining academic quality and the reputation of Holmes’ graduates.
Table 1: Six Categories of Academic Integrity Breaches Category Description Plagiarism Reproducing the work of someone else without attribution. When a student submits their own work on multiple occasions this is known as self-plagiarism. Collusion Working with one or more other individuals to complete an assignment, in a way that is not authorized. Copying Reproducing and submitting the work of another student, with or without their knowledge. If a student fails to take reasonable precautions to prevent their own original work from being copied, this may also be considered an offence. Impersonation Falsely presenting oneself, or engaging someone else to present as oneself, in an in-person examination. Contract cheating Contracting a third party to complete an assessment task, generally in exchange for money or other manner of payment. Data fabrication and falsification Manipulating or inventing data with the intent of supporting false conclusions, including manipulating images.