Caspian Sea Drinks needs to raise $89.00 million by issuing additional shares of stock. If the market estimates CSD will pay a dividend of $1.50 next year, which will grow at 4.31% forever and the cost of equity to be 13.40%, then how many shares of stock must CSD sell?

1 answer

To find out how many shares of stock Caspian Sea Drinks (CSD) must sell to raise $89 million, we can use the Gordon Growth Model (also known as the Dividend Discount Model). This model determines the value of a stock based on the expected future dividends that grow at a constant rate.

The formula for the value of a stock according to the Gordon Growth Model is:

\[ P_0 = \frac{D_1}{r - g} \]

Where:

  • \(P_0\) = price of the stock today
  • \(D_1\) = expected dividend next year
  • \(r\) = cost of equity (required return)
  • \(g\) = growth rate of dividends

Given:

  • \(D_1 = 1.50\) (next year's dividend)
  • \(r = 0.1340\) (cost of equity)
  • \(g = 0.0431\) (growth rate)

First, we need to calculate the current price of the stock \(P_0\):

\[ P_0 = \frac{1.50}{0.1340 - 0.0431} \]

Calculating the denominator:

\[ 0.1340 - 0.0431 = 0.0909 \]

Now calculate \(P_0\):

\[ P_0 = \frac{1.50}{0.0909} \approx 16.52 \]

Now that we know the price of each share is approximately $16.52, we can determine how many shares need to be issued to raise $89 million:

\[ \text{Number of shares} = \frac{\text{Total funds required}}{P_0} = \frac{89,000,000}{16.52} \]

Calculating the number of shares:

\[ \text{Number of shares} \approx 5,386,678.77 \]

Since CSD cannot issue a fraction of a share, they would need to issue approximately 5,386,679 shares to raise $89 million.