...E-Loyalty Your Secret Weapon on the Web In the rush to build Internet businesses, many executives concentrate all their attention on attracting customers rather than retaining them. That's a mistake. The unique economics of e-business make customer loyalty more important than ever. by Frederick F. Reichheld and Phil Schefter L OYALTY MAY NOT BE THE FIRST * idea that pops into your head when you think ahout electronic commerce. After all, what relevance could such a quaint, oldfashioned notion hold for a world in which customers defect at the click of a mouse and impersonal shopping hots scour databases for ever hetter deals? What good is a small-town virtue amid the faceless anonymity of the Internet's HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW July-August 2000 glohal marketplace? Loyalty must he on a fast track toward extinction, right? Not at all. Chief executives at the cutting edge of e-commerce-from Dell Computer's Michael Dell to eBay's Meg Whitman, from Vanguard's Jack Brennan to Grainger's Richard Keyser-care deeply about customer retention and consider it vital to the success of their on-line operations. They know that loyalty 105 E-Loyalty: Your Secret Weapon on the Web is an economic necessity: acquiring customers on the Internet is enormously expensive, and unless those customers stick around and make lots of repeat purchases over the years, profits will remain elusive. They also know it's a competitive necessity: in every industry...
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...Case a) US Mutual Fund Performance Maastricht University | | | | School of Business & Economics | | | | Place & date: | Maastricht, 5th December 2013 | | | | Name, initials: | Müller-Wilmes, VEMCroughs, ZWFWang, WCGerdsen, BHARack, MD | | For assessor only | | ID number: | I6076025I6075042I6117368I6075829I6064576 | | 1. Content | | Study: | International Business Economics | | 2. Language structure | | Course code: | EBC | | 3. Language accuracy | | Group number: | 1 | | 4. Language: Format & citing/referencing | | Writing tutor name: | Mike Langen | | Overall: | | Writing assignment: | | | Advisory grade | | | | | Assessor’s initials | | Your UM email address: v.muller-wilmes@student.maastrichtuniversity.nl, m.rack@student.maastrichtuniversity.nl, wwc.wang@student.maastrichtuniversity.nl, z.croughs@student.maastrichtuniversity.nl, b.gerdsen@student.maastrichtuniversity.nl Table of Contents Everyone has to include at his part how we did it in excel and what the conclusion of his subpart implies for the problem statement Bas (introduction, and question 1) Introduction Descriptive Data, net of cost etc Are the returns percentage? What do we expect from momentum? Do we need a table of contents? Do we need to copy the excel sheets into the paper ? or just copying the numbers as we did so far? 1. Best suitable model to measure Performance and Investigation of the different investment strategies ...
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...environment where team members can communicate with you whenever they have questions or issues. I’m sure I could on and on about this experience but I will end it here. I simply want to say thank you for this opportunity. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your team. Thank you for allowing me to contribute to the team’s success. Thank you for this opportunity to expand my knowledge. Thank you. Best regards, Emerging Technology Introduction: Vanguard has been in the financial investment industry since May 1, 1975 with its first location in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. Since then Vanguard has made a presence in North Carolina, Arizona, and international locations such as the Netherlands, France, Canada, England, Switzerland and Australia. As of December 31, 2011 Vanguard manages approximately $1.7 trillion in U.S. mutual funds and has proven to be a fierce competitor among its competition. In order to maintain this competitive edge, Vanguard could benefit greatly from taking advantage of virtual reality. Company background: Vanguard is an American investment management company that is mostly known for its low-cost index...
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...“This Above All: To Thine Own Self Be True” Chapel Address by John C. Bogle Founder and former Chairman, The Vanguard Group Episcopal Academy, Overbrook, PA December 2, 2004 Thank you, Christopher Bogle Webb St. John, my wonderful grandson, for that lovely introduction. And thank you, Nicole Spagnola, long-time friend of my superb granddaughter Ashley St. John, for inviting me to join you and your upper school classmates today. While I’m proud of my reputation, I confess to you all—this may surprise you—that I’m a bit intimidated to stand here before you today. While many of your parents may know a bit about me and Vanguard, you are probably wondering just what this ancient soul can possibly say that would even vaguely interest you. Why would I think that? Because I was actually your age once, trying to find my way in life, in school, and with my family and friends. My hesitancy is illustrated by this story that I heard last year in a sermon by a Scottish preacher: A father is rapping on his son’s door, trying to wake him up to go to school. Through the closed door, the son shouts: “I’m not going to get up, and I’ll give you three reasons why. “One, I hate school. “Two, the children tease me. “Three, because education is boring.” The father shouts right back: “You must get up, and I’ll give you three reasons why. “One, it’s your duty. “Two, because you’re 45 years old. “And three, because you’re the headmaster.” Well, despite my concern about “relating” to you young people...
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...you have questions about your benefits or stock, please contact the appropriate entity listed below. Plans administered through: Aetna Healthcare 888-220-1017 https://member.aetna.com/Member_Public/ Definity Healthcare 866-333-4648 www.definityhealth.com Vision Service Plan (VSP) 800-877-7195 www.vsp.com WageWorks – Flexible Spending Accounts 877-924-3967 www.wageworks.com Delta Dental/WA Dental Service 800-238-3107 https://www.deltadentalwa.com Conexis – COBRA 877-722-2667 www.conexis.org Magellan – Employee Assistance Program 800-523-5668 http://www.magellanassist.com/ Minnesota Life 800-843-8358 Putnam Investments – 529 Plan 800-685-6542 www.ibenefitcenter.com The Vanguard Group – 401(k) Plan 800-523-1188 www.vanguard.com The Hartford – Disability 800-303-9744 Charles Schwab 800-654-2593 http://eac.schwab.com It is XXX policy to pay an employee for the balance of accrued but unused vacation at the time of termination. This payment ordinarily will be included in the employee's final paycheck. XXX does not pay out for personal time that is unused at the time of...
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...Beta Management Company | | |Investment Management case study | Table of contents Backgrounds……………………………………………………….……1 Strategies………………………………………………………………...1 Background of California R.E.I.T and Brown Group Inc……………2 Return and risk…………………………………………………….....…2 Summary………………………………………………………………...4 Appendix………………………………………………………………...5 Background: Beta Management Company is a small investment management company based in a Boston suburb founded in 1988. As the company developed, they had roughly 25 million dollars in the 1991. The goal of the company is to enhance returns but reduce risks for clients via market timing. Currently, the company’s funds were invested into the Vanguard 500, an S&P 500 no-load and low-expense index funds (with the reminder in money market instruments). As time goes by, Sarah Wolfe who is the founder of this company think about increasing her equity exposure to 80% with the purchase of individual stock. Strategies: Firstly, Sarah Wolfe uses a market timing strategy based on two portfolios: the Vanguard Index and money market. In order to obtain the capital gains, once the company predicts the market value will rise, it will transfer its assets from the money market to the Index. The limit will up to a maximum 99% of total assets. On the other hand when the company expects the market value will decrease, it...
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...| Marketing the Vanguard Group | Marketing 532 | | Karen Garcia | 11/29/2011 | | Executive Summary Vanguard group is a Mutual Funds sales company who specializes in offering low cost and long-term investments. Sixty percent of their assets are held by retail consumers, and the remaining forty percent is held by institutions through corporate retirement plans. In 2003, although Vanguard had one of the lowest operating costs in the industry as a percent of average net assets, the firm also experienced a significant amount of churn, or customer loss. To address strategic issues such as maintaining a low cost structure, customer churn, and profitability across target markets. The firm implemented a reorganization plan which measured quantitative as well as qualitative aspects in their operations. Metric system tools were put in place to measure how the firm operated in the different business segments they serviced. A special emphasis was placed in how marketing efforts should be concentrated to increase growth, how value propositions could be improved, and how costs could be minimized without sacrificing service and product qualities. Service Description Vanguard group provided low-cost long-term mutual fund investments to consumers. Although the two major business categories were retail clients and institutional private retirement funds. Within the two major categories Vanguard had three consumer groups: Core clients who held up to $250,000 in assets, Voyager...
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...October 1, 2012 Case Study#6: Beta Management Company In 1988, Sarah Wolfe formed and became the CEO of an investment management company named Beta Management Company in the Boston metro area. It was primarily created due to the results of the October 1987 market crash when a rich married couple was saddened by their investment losses. In early 1991, Ms. Wolfe was pondering whether or not to initiate a plan to set out new objectives and guidelines for Beta in the upcoming year. Currently, Beta’s stated purpose was to enhance the returns and reduce risks for her high-net-worth clients through market timing. In order to accomplish this task, Ms. Wolfe would keep the vast majority of Beta’s funds in no-load, low-expense index funds; and, the rest of the money would go into money market instruments. Keeping the market exposure between 50% and 99%, she eventually established the limited use of Vanguard’s Index 500 Trust because it had a very low expense ratio and its success resembled the S&P 500 Index’s return. By January 4, 1991, Beta had 79.2% of its $25 million in assets ($19.8 million) invested in the Vanguard index fund. However, the firm had also lost possible new clients because Ms. Wolfe had only used the Vanguard fund instead of investing in its own stocks. In order to combat this problem, Beta’s new investment strategy was to increase the number of stocks in its portfolio instead of relying on just one pure equity investment, the Vanguard fund. This is process...
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...1) Based on the first three paragraphs of the case, explain Beta Management Company's (BMC) investment strategy. Is it compatible with market efficiency theories? BMC’s Investment Strategy To enhance returns and reduce risks is a general objective of risk-averse investors and shouldn’t be considered an investment strategy proper. BMC follows a market timing investment strategy based on two portfolios: the Vanguard Index and money market (i.e., short-term) instruments. When BMC expects the market to rise, it transfers its assets from the money market to the Index (up to a maximum of 99% of total assets), seeking to obtain capital gains; when BMC expects the market to fall, it transfers back the assets from the Index to the money market instruments (down to a minimum of 50%), so as to avoid capital losses. By setting a floor of 50% on the investment on the Index, BMC endeavours to maintain at all times a return spread so as to “enhance returns”, while seeking to partly capitalize on unpredicted rises (at the cost of losses if the market behaves as predicted). By setting a very high ceiling for the investment in the Index (99%), BMC is willing to take on extra risk to try to fully capitalize on predicted rises. The investment strategy has thus some aggressive elements in it. The objective of “risk reduction” might better accomplished by setting both a lower ceiling and, particularly, a lower floor. Advantages of the Vanguard Index: - Low transaction costs (important in a market...
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...Modern Portfolio Theory in the Modern Economy: MPT During the Credit Crisis 0f 2008 Abstract There are various theories of risk and return as it pertains to measuring and predicting investment return in a portfolio- one of the oldest and most prominent being Modern Portfolio Theory .An example of a hypothetical portfolio utilizing the principles of MPT invested during the credit crisis of late 2008/early 2009 will be utilized in part. In direct application, does Modern Portfolio theory hold strong during a major financial crisis? Past research will be compared to present the mechanics and applications of MPT order to answer the questions poised and to create hypothetical portfolios based on past fund performance during the time period of 2007 -2010. It is expected that a portfolio using MPT would not have performed significantly better than any other less diversified investment. Contents Introduction……………………………………..........................................................................4-7 Credit Crisis Thesis Statement Modern Portfolio Defined Prior Research Prediction Method…………………………………………………….........................................................8-9 Parameters/ Source of Portfolios Results……………………………………………………......................................................10-19 A. Application/ graphs Conclusion…………………………………………...............………………………............19-20 Restatement of Thesis Discussion of Results Limitations Recommendation References……………………………………………………………………...
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...| Beta Management Company Case Report | | Full name: Student ID: Class Time: Lecturer's Name: | Table of Contents I.Case background 2 II.Sarah Wolfe 2 III.Background of California R.E.I.T. and Brown Group, Inc. 3 IV.Return and risk 4 V.Summarize in bullet points what you learn from your case analysis. 7 VI.Appendix 8 I. Case background Who: Sarah Wolfe who is the founder and also the CEO of Beta Management Company Where: Small investment companies near a suburb of Boston When: The Beta Management Group was formed in 1988. Up to 1991, high-net-worth individual clients totaling $25 million in assets were under control by the Beta Management Group. What: She had been successful in the management of Beta’s funds by focusing on the Vanguard Index 500 Trust, even generating good returns in the worst of times. After doubling the size of Beta, she decided to pick some smaller stocks to go along with the index mutual fund. She also planned to increase the proportion of Beta’s assets in equities. II. Sarah Wolfe Strategy applied was to timing the market can be simply defined “buy low and sell high” to minimize the risk and enhance returns for clients since 1988. To get higher return by eliminating the risk was one of the good ways to add value for clients. Another strategy was to explore the range of market strategy. She has successfully adjusted the level of market exposures between 50% and 99%. The best way was chosen to maintain and adjust equity...
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...1. Case: Beta Management 2. The Objectives 1. To gain practice in calculating risk and return measures on stocks and portfolios, including estimation of beta for stocks by simple regressions. 2. To understand concepts of total risk, portfolio risk, diversifiable and undiversifiable risk, and how these relate to the beta. 3. To gain an appreciation of the relation between risk and return, and the CAPM. 4. To allow an introductory discussion of investment strategies. 3. The Issues 1. The Strategy 2. The Choices 3. The Risks 4. The Port Folio Risks 5. The Return 4. The Strategy Ms.Wolfe Keeps majority of funds in no load, low-expense index funds. She preferably use vanguard’s Index 500 Trust due to its extremely low expense ratio and its success at closely matching the return of the S&P 500 index. She make money for its client by investing in index fund even in down market year. Company loses potential new clients because She only use index mutual fund and use none of its own stocks. 5. Company decided to purchase individual stock to make the equity portfolio. Focus on smaller stocks are made to invest. She focus on two stocks :California REIT and Brown group. Both stocks are NYSE listed and stock price are bad over past two year. Both stocks are volatile stocks. The Choices 6. Some Information of REITS (REIT, WWW.reit.com) REIT: Real Estate Investment Trust. A REIT invests in income-producing property, and may also invest in loans on property...
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...Table of Contents Introduction 4 Core Concept – Organizational Culture 4 Core Concept – Motivation through Goal Setting 6 Core Concept – Quality Circles 7 Core Concept – Knowledge Management 8 Conclusion 8 Vanguard 9 The Ritz-Carlton 10 Gateway 11 Hewlett Packard 12 Microsoft 13 Dell 14 Ford 15 General Motors 16 References 18 Abstract Team C will contrast Intersect Investments with other companies who have shared like issues of transformation. In the overview, Intersect Investments has acknowledged a new vision to enhance the company and be competitive. Intersect Investments will try to meet the goals by creating new services and products by using the customer intimacy model. This model will assist in Intersect Investment improving customer satisfaction and increasing sales. In this paper, Team C will benchmark different organizations to provide guidance regarding the modifications needed to meet these goals. Introduction Intersect Investment Services is afforded the opportunity to company’s and benchmark successes from like similar companiesy’s and apply this insight to reach their goals and objectives. A mission statement represents the “reason” an organization exists, and an organization’s vision is a long-term goal that describes “what” an organization wants to become” (Kreitner & Kinicki, 2004). CEO Frank Jeffer’s decision to implement this vision has the makings to increase profit and regain the trust of the consumer base. This vision encompasses...
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...Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle and its Implications for Financial Institutions Submitted in Partial Fulfilment of Master of Business Administration By KARTIK CHANDRA CHATURVEDI Batch (2013-2015) University Roll No: S133F0010 December 2014 Under the guidance of NIDHI KAICKER SCHOOL OF BUSINESS, PUBLIC POLICY AND SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP AMBEDKAR UNIVERSITY DELH PAGE 1 CERTIFICATE This is to certify that I have successfully completed the project titled Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle and its Implications for Financial Institutions submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Business Administration at the School of Business, Public Policy and Social Entrepreneurship, Ambedkar University Delhi. It is further certified that the submitted report is based on original research work carried out by me. The material obtained from secondary sources is duly acknowledged. [Student Signature] KARTIK ……………………………………………………………………………..CHANDRA ……………………………………………………………………………..CHATURVEDI Roll No S133F0010 Batch: 2013-15 [Dean Signature] Dean SBPPSE [Faculty Signature] Faculty Advisor PAGE 2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I have taken efforts in this project. However, it would not have been possible without the kind support and help of many individuals in the organization and School of Business, Public Policy and Social Entrepreneurship, Ambedkar University, Delhi. I would like to extend my sincere thanks to all of them. I am highly...
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...the risks that would be common to domestic and international funds, and those risks that would be unique to international fund. 3) Discuss how the fact that foreign company is not subject to the same accounting, auditing, and financial reporting standards and practices as U.S. companies. 4) Consider the allocations of fund assets by region. Speculate as to why the proportions of fund assets are distributed in this manner. 5) Consider the Country diversification of fund assets. Identify the countries in which the fund is most heavily invested. Speculate as to why this might be the case. Are there and countries in which you would have expected the fund to be invested and it is not? 6) Consider the sector diversification of fund assets. Identify the sectors in which the fund is most heavily invested. Speculate as to why this might be the case. FACTS The Vanguard Group is an investment firm with more than 50 different mutual funds in which the public may invest. Among these funds are 13 international funds that concentrate on investments in non-U.S. stocks and bonds. One of these is the International Growth Fund. The following information about this fund was provided in the fund’s prospectus, dated December 28, 2009. The Fund invests mainly in common stocks of non-U.S. companies that are considered to have above- average potential for growth. The asset-weighted median market capitalization of the Fund as of August 31, 2009, was $34.7...
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