Consider the case of Red Pencil Office Supplies:

Red Pencil Office Supplies is a mature firm that has a stable flow of business. The following data was taken from its financial statements last year:

Annual sales	$9,700,000
Cost of goods sold	$7,275,000
Inventory	$3,200,000
Accounts receivable	$2,100,000
Accounts payable	$2,800,000

1. Red Pencils CFO is interested in determining the length of time funds are tied up in working capital. Use the information in the preceding table to complete the following table. (Note: Use 365 days as the length of a year in all calculations, and round all values to two decimal places.)

	Value
Inventory Conversion Period
Average collection period
Payables Deferral Period
Cash conversion cycle

^Please fill in the correct value above.

2. Both the inventory conversion period and payables deferral period use the average daily COGS in their denominators, whereas the average collection period uses average daily sales in its denominator. Why do these measures use different inputs?

a. Inventory and accounts payable are carried at cost on the balance sheet, whereas accounts receivable are recorded at the price at which goods are sold.

b. Current assets should be divided by sales, but current liabilities should be divided by the COGS.

The management at Red Pencil Office Supplies wants to continue its internal discussions related to its cash management. One of the finance team members presents the following case about Loud Noise Recordings to his cohorts:

Case in Discussion

Loud Noise Recordingss management plans to finance its operations with bank loans that will be repaid as soon as cash is available. The companys management expects that it will take 40 days to manufacture and sell its products and 35 days to receive payment from its customers. Loud Noises CFO has told the rest of the management team that they should expect the length of the bank loans to be approximately 75 days.

3. Which of the following responses to the CFOs statement is most accurate?

a. The CFO is not taking into account the amount of time the company has to pay its suppliers. Generally, there is a certain length of time between the purchase of materials and labor and the payment of cash for them. The CFO can reduce the estimated length of the bank loan by this amount of time.

b. The CFOs approximation of the length of the bank loans should be accurate, because it will take 75 days for the company to manufacture, sell, and collect cash for its goods. All these things must occur for the company to be able to repay its loans from the bank.