You are given the following estimated per share data related to the S&P 500 Index for the year 2018: 

Sales.............................$ 1,950.00

Depreciation........................98.00

Interest expense.................58.00

You are also informed that the estimated operating profit (EBIT) margin is 12 percent and the tax rate is 32 percent. 

a. Compute the estimated EPS for 2018. 

b. Assume that a member of the research committee for your firm feels that it is important to consider a range of operating profit margin (OPM) estimates. Therefore, you are asked to derive both optimistic and pessimistic EPS estimates using II and 13 percent for the OPM and holding everything else constant.