FizziPop Beverages is one of the leading producers of carbonated drinks. Its annual earnings, number of outstanding shares of common stock and EPS (earnings per share) for the past several years are summarized below:

Year Earnings (M$) Shares (M) EPS ($) EPS Growth (%) 2008 24.0 12.0 $2.00 - 2009 24.6 12.5 $1.97 -1.5% 2010 28.7 12.7 $2.26 14.7% 2011 29.0 13.2 $2.20 -2.7%

For 2012, analysts project earnings of 31.3 million and FizziPop will have 13.4 million shares of common stock outstanding at the end of the year as it plans to issue an additional 200,000 shares in the 3rd quarter for executive bonuses. If FizziPop achieves the analysts estimates and the calculated annual EPS growth for 2012 from question 2 is at a constant rate throughout the year, what would the effective quarterly growth rate be?

CALCULATED VARIABLES: 2012epsgr = 0.064 (6.4%) 2012eps = $2.34