HHI has 20 million shares outstanding, as well as $64 million in debt. The founder of HHI, Harry
Harrison, made his fortune in the fast food business. He sold off part of his fast food empire, and purchased a professional hockey team. HHI’s only assets are the hockey team, together with
50% of the outstanding shares of Harry’s Hotdogs restaurant chain. Harry’s Hotdogs (HDG) has a market capitalization of $850 million, and an enterprise value of $1.05 billion. After a little research, you find that the average asset beta of other fast food restaurant chains is 0.75. You also find that the debt of HHI and HDG is highly rated, and so you decide to estimate the beta of both firms’ debt as zero. Finally, you do a regression analysis on HHI’s historical stock returns in comparison to the S&P 500, and estimate an equity beta of 1.33. Given this information, estimate the beta of HHI’s investment in the hockey team.
HHI Equity = 32 × 20 = $640
HHI debt = $64
HHI asset beta = (640/(640+64)) 1.33 + (64/(640+64)) 0 = 1.21
Holdings of Hotdogs = 850/2 = 425
Value of Hockey Team = (640+64)-425 = $279
Hotdog equity beta : (850/1050) × Be + (200/1050) × 0 = 0.75
Be = 0.75 × 1050/850 = 0.93 for hotdog equity
So, if B = hockey team beta,
(425/(425+279)) 0.93 + (279/(425+279)) × B = 1.21
B = 1.64
Beta of hockey team =