Direct Materials Variances

De Soto Inc. produces tablet computers. The company uses Thin Film Crystal (TFC) LCD displays for its products. Each tablet uses one display. The company produced 770 tablets during July. However, due to LCD defects, the company actually used 800 LCD displays during July. Each display has a standard cost of $12.50. Eight hundred LCD displays were purchased for July production at a cost of $9,400.

Determine the price variance, quantity variance, and total direct materials cost variance for July.

Enter a favorable variance as a negative number using a minus sign and an unfavorable variance as a positive number.

Price variance $ Favorable
Quantity variance $ Unfavorable
Total direct materials cost variance $ Favorable
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Unfavorable variances can be thought of as increasing costs (a debit). Favorable variances can be thought of as decreasing costs (a credit).

The direct material cost variance is the difference between the actual and standard material cost.

At a student café, there are equal numbers of two types of customers with the following values. the café owner cannot distinguish between the two types of students because many students without early classes arrive early anyway (i.e., she cannot price-discriminate). students with early classes students without early classes coffee 70 60 banana 51 101 the marginal cost of coffee is 10 and the marginal cost of a banana is 40. the café owner is considering three pricing strategies: 1. mixed bundling: price bundle of coffee and a banana for 161, or just a coffee for 70. 2. price separately: offer coffee at 60, price a banana at 101. 3. bundle only: coffee and a banana for 121. do not offer goods separately. assume that if the price of an item or bundle is no more than exactly equal to a student's willingness to pay, then the student will purchase the item or bundle. for simplicity, assume there is just one student with an early class, and one student without an early class. price strategy revenue from pricing strategy cost from pricing strategy profit from pricing strategy 1. mixed bundling $ $ $ 2. price separately $ $ $ 3. bundle only $ $ $ pricing strategy yields the highest profit for the café owner.

Four key marketing decision variables are price (p), advertising (a), transportation (t), and product quality (q). consumer demand (d) is influenced by these variables. the simplest model for describing demand in terms of these variables is: d = k – pp + aa + tt + qq where k, p, a, t, and q are constants. discuss the assumptions of this model. specifically, how does each variable affect demand? how do the variables influence each other? what limitations might this model have? how can it be improved?

Ido not understand this project overview agricultural commodities are bought and sold through the stock exchange. the price of commodities changes all the time. investors buy many agricultural commodities before they are ready for shipping. when an investor buys an agricultural commodity that is going to be ready in the future, they call this purchasing futures. this might be a future crop, meat that has not yet been processed, or another type of agricultural commodity. for this project, you will have to decide how to spend $10,000. research the new york stock exchange. find one or more agricultural commodities that you are interested in. remember, it may be listed as a future crop. instructions identify the agricultural commodities that you think have the best chance of going up in price. think about what is going on with supply and demand. decide how you will spend your money. you may purchase only agricultural commodities. check the market every day for a week. record the price of your commodity or commodities each day. you may buy or sell your commodities at any time during the week. you may sell your commodities and buy different ones. feel free to experiment with the $10,000 by buying and selling commodities, but make sure to keep a careful record of your activities. at the end of the week, you will write a report on your investments. this report should be structured to include this information: page 1: explain how the stock market works. page 2: list all commodities purchased. describe each in detail. discuss why you selected these commodities. remember, they must be agricultural. page 3: create a chart or graph to illustrate the price of your commodity or commodities over the week’s time. list all of your activity buying and selling. make sure you include prices and details. page 4: write a summary of your experience. describe what you might do differently if you were using actual money. propose potential reasons why the price of each commodity may go up or down.