Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-04T19:10:43.720Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Renewing Assets with Uncertain Revenues and Operating Costs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 December 2010

Roger Adkins
Affiliation:
School of Management, University of Bradford, Emm Lane, Bradford BD9 4JL, UK. [email protected]
Dean Paxson
Affiliation:
Manchester Business School, University of Manchester, Booth Street West, Manchester M15 6PB, UK. [email protected]

Abstract

We study optimal replacement and abandonment decisions for real assets, when both revenues and costs are uncertain and deteriorate with age. We develop an implicit representation of the renewal boundary as the solution to a set of simultaneous equations. This quasi-analytical method has the merit of computational ease and transparency. We show that the correlation between revenues and operating costs has a significant influence on the renewal boundary, and that the increase in revenue immediately following a renewal has a greater relative influence on the boundary than either operating cost or renewal cost. The quasi-analytical method is sufficiently flexible to deal with other real option models involving 2 variables.

Type
Research Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Michael G. Foster School of Business, University of Washington 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Adkins, R., and Paxson, D.. Real Replacement Decisions in a Stochastic World.” Working Paper, Manchester Business School (2010).Google Scholar
Bellman, R. E. “Equipment Replacement Policy.” Journal of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, 3 (1955), 133136.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boyle, P. P. “A Lattice Framework for Option Pricing with Two State Variables.” Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, 23 (1988), 112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brennan, M. J., and Schwartz, E. S.. “Finite Difference Methods and Jump Processes Arising in the Pricing of Contingent Claims: A Synthesis.” Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, 13 (1978), 461474.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brennan, M. J., and Schwartz, E. S.. “Evaluating Natural Resource Investments.” Journal of Business, 58 (1985), 135157.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Childs, P. D.; Mauer, D. C.; and Ott, S. H.. “Interactions of Corporate Financing and Investment Decisions: The Case of Agency Conflicts.” Journal of Financial Economics, 76 (2005), 667690.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Constantinides, G. M. “Market Risk Adjustment in Project Valuation.” Journal of Finance, 33 (1978), 603616.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cortazar, G.. “Simulation and Numerical Methods in Real Options Valuation.” In Real Options and Investment under Uncertainty: Classical Readings and Recent Contributions, Schwartz, E. S. and Trigeorgis, L., eds. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press (2001).Google Scholar
Cox, D. R., and Miller, H. D.. The Theory of Stochastic Processes. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons (1965).Google Scholar
Dixit, A. K., and Pindyck, R. S.. Investment under Uncertainty. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press (1994).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dobbs, I. M. “Replacement Investment: Optimal Economic Life under Uncertainty.” Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, 31 (2004), 729757.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dyl, E. A., and Long, H. W.. “Abandonment Value and Capital Budgeting: Comment.” Journal of Finance, 24 (1969), 8895.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feldstein, M. S., and Rothschild, M.. “Towards an Economic Theory of Replacement Investment.” Econometrica, 42 (1974), 393424.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaumitz, J. E., and Emery, D. R.. “Asset Growth, Abandonment Value and the Replacement Decision of Like-for-Like Capital Assets.” Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, 15 (1980), 407419.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Geske, R., and Shastri, K.. “Valuation by Approximation: A Comparison of Alternative Option Valuation Techniques.” Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, 20 (1985), 4571.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grenadier, S. R. “The Strategic Exercise of Options: Development Cascades and Overbuilding in Real Estate Markets.” Journal of Finance, 51 (1996), 16531679.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howe, K. M., and McCabe, G. M.. “On Optimal Asset Abandonment and Replacement.” Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, 18 (1983), 295305.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kaplan, W., and Lewis, D. J.. Calculus and Linear Algebra. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons (1971).Google Scholar
Linnard, W., and Gane, M.. “Martin Faustmann and the Evolution of Discounted Cash Flow: Two Articles from the Original German of 1849.” University of Oxford: Commonwealth Forestry Institute (1968).Google Scholar
Lutz, F., and Lutz, V.. The Theory of Investment of the Firm. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press (1951).Google Scholar
Malchow-Møller, N., and Thorsen, B. J.. “Repeated Real Options: Optimal Investment Behaviour and a Good Rule of Thumb.” Journal of Economic Dynamics & Control, 29 (2005), 10251041.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Margrabe, W.. “The Value of an Option to Exchange One Asset for Another.” Journal of Finance, 33 (1978), 177186.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mason, S. P., and Merton, R. C.. “The Role of Contingent Claims Analysis in Corporate Finance.” In Recent Advances in Corporate Finance, Altman, E. I. and Subrahmanyam, M. G., eds. Homewood, IL: Richard D. Irwin (1985).Google Scholar
Mauer, D. C., and Ott, S. H.. “Investment under Uncertainty: The Case of Replacement Investment Decisions.” Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, 30 (1995), 581605.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McDonald, R. L., and Siegel, D. R.. “The Value of Waiting to Invest.” Quarterly Journal of Economics, 101 (1986), 707728.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merrett, A. J., and Sykes, A.. Capital Budgeting and Company Finance. London, UK: Longman (1966).Google Scholar
Myers, S. C., and Majd, M.. “Abandonment Value and Project Life.” Advances in Futures and Options Research, 4 (1990), 121.Google Scholar
Myers, S. C., and Turnbull, S. M.. “Capital Budgeting and the Capital Asset Pricing Model: Good News and Bad News.” Journal of Finance, 32 (1977), 321333.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Preinreich, G. A. D. “The Economic Life of Industrial Equipment.” Econometrica, 8 (1940), 1244.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Press, W. H.; Teukolsky, S. A.; Vetterling, W. T.; and Flannery, B. P.. Numerical Recipes: The Art of Scientific Computing. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press (1991).Google Scholar
Rust, J.. “Optimal Replacement of GMC Bus Engines: An Empirical Model of Harold Zurcher.” Econometrica, 55 (1987), 9991033.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shimko, D. C. Finance in Continuous Time: A Primer. Miami, FL: Kolb Publishing (1992).Google Scholar
Sick, G.. “Capital Budgeting with Real Options.” In Monograph Series in Finance and Economics: Salomon Brothers Center for the Study of Financial Institutions, New York University (1989).Google Scholar
Stapleton, R. C.; Hemmings, D. B.; and Scholefield, H. H.. “Technical Change and the Optimal Life of Assets.” Operational Research Quarterly, 23 (1972), 4559.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Terborgh, G. W. Dynamic Equipment Policy. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill (1949).Google Scholar
Tourinho, O. A. F. “The Valuation of Reserves of Natural Resources: An Option Pricing Approach.” Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California, Berkeley(1979).Google Scholar
Trigeorgis, L.. Real Options: Managerial Flexibility and Strategy in Resource Allocation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press (1996).Google Scholar
Williams, J. T. “Real Estate Development as an Option.” Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, 4 (1991), 191208.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williams, J. T. “Redevelopment of Real Assets.” Real Estate Economics, 25 (1997), 387407.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ye, M.-H.. “Optimal Replacement Policy with Stochastic Maintenance and Operation Costs.” European Journal of Operational Research, 44 (1990), 8494.CrossRefGoogle Scholar