Question $1$

Candy Messinger is searching for good investments in which to place her firm's capital. She is the CEO and president of PU Consulting and must decide which of the following mutually exclusive projects to invest in$.$ Given below are the projects cash flows; all require the same initial investment of $$2$ billion. The appropriate discount rate for all projects is $9\%.$

$\backslash$table$[[,$Project $1,$Project $2,$Project $3,$Project $4],[$Initial Investment,$$-2,000,$$$-2,000,-2,000,-2,000],[$Year $1,430,0,160,320],[2,440,0,240,320],[3,320,0,360,320],[4,320,0,380,320],[5,320,0,400,320],[6,320,0,420,320],[7,520,0,420,320],[8,1,200,0,420,320],[9,0,0,420,320],[10,0,0,420,320],[11,0,0,420,320],[12,0,0,420,320],[13,0,8,000,420,320]]$

$($a$)$ Rank the projects using the NPV criterion.

$($b$)$ Rank the projects using the IRR criterion.

$($c$)$ How do your answers to $($a$)$ and $($b$)$ change if the discount rate decreases to $7\%?$