Research Design

A research design or methodology is a framework for conducting a research

project. It sets out the strategy or strategies to be employed in collecting, analysing
and presenting data.
The main topic, taken from the Financial Services CAPE syllabus, were Portfolio
Management, Capital Structure and Stock Valuation. Under these topics, portfolio
returns, portfolio risk and stock valuation were studied, focusing on Holding
Period Return, Arithmetic Mean Return, Geometric Mean Return, Risk-Adjusted
Returns, Sharper Ratio and Variance of Returns.
The Holding Period Return is calculate on the total returns from the asset or
portfolio. The arithmetic mean return is the sum of the holding period divided by
the total count of the series; and the geometric mean return is basically the set of
assets.
The 4-firm portfolio used was selected using the investment style of market
capitalization. Market capitalization is the market value of a company’s
outstanding shares. It is found by taking the stock price and multiplying it by the
total volume of shares, or the total number of shares outstanding. The firms in the
portfolio were selected from the Trinidad Stock Exchange, using the market
capitalization method. Ten firms were selected, and four of those selected firms
were singled out, categorising them by large cap, medium cap and small cap.
These was one large cap, two medium cap and one small cap.
For further analysis, one firm was selected at random in order to complete the
stock valuation section of the project.
Tables, charts, and graphs were used to present data for the project. Further, to
evaluate portfolio performance, and frim performance, the methods employed
were, as said before, holding period return, arithmetic mean return, geometric
mean return, risk-adjusted return, weighted standard deviation, stock valuation.
In analysing the data, qualitative and quantitative research were used. Qualitative
research revolves around the description and analysis of data. Meaning is sought
out from all the data collected. This data includes observations. Quantitative
research deals mostly with numbers, and statistics. This research is all about
quantity, meaning and figures.