1. Another option for the same contract has the contractor guaranteed to be paid his costs plus 20%, for costs that exceed $600,000. With the same initial assumption—guarantee of $800,000 gross payment (no requirement to itemize costs), but if the contractor can show that costs exceed $600,000, the project will pay $800,000 plus the costs that exceed $600,000, plus 20% of those excess costs, with a ceiling of $900,000 gross. The contractor demonstrates he spent $623,000. How much (gross) must the project remit to the contractor?

Rate of return douglas keel, a financial analyst for orange industries, wishes to estimate the rate of return for two similar-risk investments, x and y. douglas's research indicates that the immediate past returns will serve as reasonable estimates of future returns. a year earlier, investment x had a market value of $27 comma 000; and investment y had a market value of $46 comma 000. during the year, investment x generated cash flow of $2 comma 025 and investment y generated cash flow of $ 6 comma 770. the current market values of investments x and y are $28 comma 582 and $46 comma 000, respectively. a. calculate the expected rate of return on investments x and y using the most recent year's data. b. assuming that the two investments are equally risky, which one should douglas recommend? why?