Strategic Financial Management

Zaenal Arifin
 Financial objectives and Shareholder
Wealth
Investors maximize their wealth by:
Selecting optimum investment and financing
opportunities
Using financial models that maximize expected return
at minimum risk
The normative objective of financial management
should be:
To implement investment and financing decision using
risk-adjusted wealth maximizing criteria, which satisfy
the firms owners by placing them all in an equal,
optimum financial position
 The function of strategic financial
management can be deconstructed into four
components based on the mathematical
concept of expected net present value
maximization
The investement
Dividend
Financing
Portfolio decision
 Wealth creation and value added
Modern finance theory regards capital investment as
the springboard for wealth creation
Financial managers maximize stakeholders wealth by
generating cash returns that are more favourable than
those available elsewhere
If their investemnt policies satisfy consumer needs,
firms should make profit that at least equal their
overall cost of funds, as measured by their investors
disired rate of return
These will be distributed to the providers of debt
(interest), shareholders (dividend), or retained to
finance future investement to create capital gains
 If profit > overall cost of funds create Economic
Value Added (EVA)
Given an efficient capital market, EVA create Market
Value Added (MVA)
Companies engaged in inefficient activities (negative
EVA) are gradually strarved of finance, because of
reduced dividends, inadequate retentions and the
capital markets unwillingness to replenish their asset
base at lower market price
Figure 1.2 distinguish the winners from the losers
Corporate Economic Performance: Winners and
Losers

Satisfy Market
Success
Identify Market Needs
Investment Opportunities
Failure Success Failure

Finance Success Profit

Failure
 The Investment and Finance Decision
We can define succesfull management policies of
wealth maximization, in terms of two distinct but
inter-related function:
Investment policy select an optimum portfolio
investement opportunities that maximize anticipated
net cash flows at minimum risk
Finance policy identify potential fund sources required
to sustain investment, evaluate the risk-adjusted
return expected by each, and then select the optimum
mix that will minimize their overall WACC
 The 2 function are interrelated because:
The financial return required by a companys
capital provider must be compared to its business
return from investment proposals, to establish
whether they should be accepted
And while investment decision obviously
precede finance decision, what ultimately
concerns the firm is not only the profitability
but also whether it satisfies the capital
markets financial expectations.
 Strategic managerial investment and finance
functions are therefore inter-related via a
companys WACC
WACC is a complex concept, it embraces explicit
interest on borrowing or dividends paid to
shareholders.
However, companies also finance their operations
by utilising funds form a variety of sources, both
long and short term, at an implicit or opportunity
cost.
Trade credit granted by supplier
Deferred taxation
Retained earnings
Depreciation and other non-cash expenses
 In term of investment decision, a firms WACC
represents the overall cut-off rate, that
justifies the financial decision to acquire
funding for an investment proposal
If corporate cash profit exceed WACC then
NPV will be positive, producing a positive EVA
If management wish to increase shareholder
wealth (MVA), then it must create positive
EVA as the driver
 Srategic Financial Management
Finance Decision Investment
(External) Decision (Internal)

Capital
Acquisition Disposition Assets
-Equity
of Funds of Funds -Fixed
-Debt
- Current
-Govt aid

Objective:
Objective: Management
Capital Market Max. Profit
Min. WACC Policy
(NPV)
Corporate
Objectives

Distribution Internal: EVA Retention

External: MVA

Capital Gain Shareholder Wealth

(Share Price)
 Decision structure and corporate
governance
Investment and financial decision process should
involve:
The continual search for investment opportunities
The selection of the most profitable opportunities
The determination of the optimal mix of internal and
external fund required to finance those opportunities
The establishment of a system of financial control
governing the acquisition and disposition of funds
The analysis of financial results as a guide to future
decision making
 None of these functions are independent of the other.
All occupy a pivotal position in the decison making
process and naturally require co-ordination at the
highest level. And this is where corporate governance
comes into play
Empirical observations of agency theory reveal that
management might act irresponsibly, or have different
objectives
These may be sub-optimal relative to shareholders
wealth max, particularly if management behavior is not
monitored, or they receive inappropriate incentives
The board of directors is widely regarded as the key to
effective corporate governance
They should not only determine ethical company
policies but also act as a constraint on any managerial
actions that might conflict with shareholders interest
 The developing finance function
Traditional
Managerial
Economic
Systematic
Behavioral
Post modern
 Traditional thinking
Positive approach, concern with what is rather
than normative and what should be
The discipline was Balance Sheet dominated
Financial mgt: a classification and description of
the long term sources of fund, how to acquire
them and at what cost
The use of funds was restricted to fixed asset
investement using techniques of payback and
accounting rate of return with emphasis upon
liquidity and profitability
 Managerial technique
Developed during the 1940s from an American
awareness that numerous wide-ranging military,
logistic techniques could successfully be applied to
short term financial management, inventory
control
Wherever possible, current assets should be
financed by current liabilities, with an emphasis
on credit worthiness
Financial mgt still lacked any theoritical objective
or model of invesment behavior
 Economic theory
Spurred on by post-war recovary and the advent of
computing, throughout the 1950s an increasing
number of academics began to refine and apply the
work of earlier economists and statisticians on
discounted revenue theory to corporate environment
The development of capital budgeting models utilising
time value of money techniques based on the
discounted cash flows concept (DCF)
By the 1960s, an econometric emphasis upon investor
and shareholder welfare: theories of share price max,
optimal capital structure, pricing of equity and debt in
capital market using partial equilibrium analysis
 the 1970s: linear techniques based uoon investor
rationality, the random behavior of economic
variables and stock market efficiency, overtook the
traditional approach.
The managerial concept of working capital with its
emphasis on solvency and liquidity at the expense
of future profitability was also subject to
economic analysis
There emerged an academic consensus that:
The normative objective of finance is represented by
the maximization of shareholders welfare measured by
share price, achievable through the max of expected
NPV of all a companys prospective capital investment
 Systematic proponents
The origins lie in management science
Still emphasize on max of corporate value
However, their most recent work focuses upon the
interaction of financial decisions with those of
other business function within imperfect market
It questions the economists assumptions that
investors are rational, return are random, and
stock markets are efficient
 Behavioral scientist
Perhaps we cant maximize anything
The analyse the reaction of individuals, firms, and
stock market participants to the impersonal
elements: cash, information and resources.
Emphasis is placed upon the role of competing
goals, expectations, and choice in decision process
 Post-Modern research
Whilst still in its infancy, its purpose seems to
provide a better understanding of how adaptive
human behavior, which may not be rational or risk
averse, determines investment, corporate and
stock market performance in todays volatile,
chaostic world and vice versa
A particular approach may be more
appropriate for a particular decision, but
overall each has a role to play in
contemporary financial management