four discussion and a stock journal entry

Business Admin Capstone Course

eActivities

Use the Internet to research a company of your choice with a focus on the company’s internal environment.

Discussion Question 1

“Strong Brands” Please respond to the following:

• Several companies use their brand as a competitive advantage. Given your knowledge about the global economy, identify three brands you believe have the strongest likelihood of remaining a source of advantage in the 21st Century and explain why.
• Explain the effects you believe the Internet’s capabilities will have on the brands you identified in the previous discussion and what the owner of the brand should do in light of them.

Discussion Question 2

eActivities

“Internal Environment” Please respond to the following:

• From the e-Activity, analyze the internal environment of the company you researched to determine that company’s strengths and weaknesses.
• Based on the strengths and weaknesses you discovered, determine what steps the company could take to positively impact the company’s competitiveness. Explain your rationale.

International Problem Course

Discussion 1

“The Collapse of the Soviet Union” Please respond to the following:

Roskin discusses three theories about causes of the collapse of the Soviet Union.

• Choose one of these theories and explain how it relates to the collapse of the USSR, and assess and justify whether it relates to its internal or external foreign policy.
• Discuss whether all three of the causes are equally at fault, or whether one, more than the other, is the basic culprit of the demise of the USSR.

Introduction to Finance Course

Discussion 1

• Using only.gov Websites report the current GDP, the current Federal deficit, the current Federal debt, and the bottom line of the current (last) budget approved by Congress (surplus or shortage). Note that the fiscal year for the federal government is October 1 – September 31.
• What inference can you draw from the numbers collected?

Stock Journal Entry

• Indicate the companies you are investing in: Select three (3) US companies that are publicly traded. Please use your knowledge and experience and pick, as many stocks as you’d like. Lastly, make sure you are practicing good diversification. Jim Cramer, Money Manger, on CNBC, plays a game at the end of his show called “Am I Diversified.” Check out a short clip to get a sense of industry diversification at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3lDxexupcE.
• Sources of Information: There are many ways to find such companies and the stock prices, including the New York Stock Exchange at http://www.nyse.com, Google Finance athttp://google.com, NASDAQ at http://www.nasdaq.com, and http://finance.yahoo.com.
• Indicate the amount you are investing in each company: Decide how you will divide $25,000 across the three (3) companies; e.g. $10,000 in Company 1, $10,000 in Company 2, and $5,000 in Company 3. You decide the amount you are investing in each company. You do not have to provide any analysis to justify your decisions. You must only provide some reason for picking that company. For example, you might invest in Ford because that company gets a lot of your money and you hear that Ford is doing well, and will continue to do well.
• Indicate the number of shares you are buying, and the price of the shares you are buying for each company: Once you decide the companies and the amount for each company, determine how many shares you can buy. If Company 1 is selling for $42.16, then you may buy $10,000/ $42.16, or 237.19 shares. But you cannot buy a part of a share, so you decide to buy either 237 or 238. In this example you buy 237 shares, at $42.16 per share, investing $9,991.92. You won’t be able to buy exactly $10,000, or $5,000, or $25,000, but it will be relatively close.