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Project Finance Guidebook April 2009. Project Finance Handbook - Objective. The objective of this Project Finance Handbook is to ensure that projects have the proper financial governance in place to provide effective cost and risk management.
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Project Finance Guidebook April 2009
Project Finance Handbook - Objective The objective of this Project Finance Handbook is to ensure that projects have the proper financial governance in place to provide effective cost and risk management • Looks to enable clear and consistent communication of financial procedures for all parties • Helps in making proper capital/expense decisions, decreasing potential audit risk to individual projects and the company as a whole • Enables accurate and consistent reporting across the entire portfolio of projects by providing structure and organization to the tracking process • The document contains the components that are needed to provide this support - by removing one step or process, the overall effectiveness of the financial governance program is reduced • At a high level, these components are: • Project Organizational Structure • Workplans • Cost/Benefit Analysis • Cost Reporting • These will be discussed in further detail in the remainder of the document
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Workplan The first step to successful budgeting is to identify the effort needed to complete the selected tasks • A detailed workplan needs to be part of the overall planning process • Must include task duration, resources, and dependencies needed to complete a specific project • Allows for clear determination of capital tasks and resources • Each team would have tasks identified by their project number and project phase • For additional information on workplan development, please refer to your PMP manuals
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Cost Template In order to accurately collect the overall costs of the project, the workplan should have a direct link to the Accounting Cost Template, or something similar, as shown • Provides the template to estimate resources, equipment, and overall costs • Allows for capital and expense allocations to be input • Enables user to see monthly cost estimates and forecast accurately from a phase and timing perspective • Totals resources by functional area (IT, Business, PMO) • Data can feed directly into the Project Financial Control Tool
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Types of Costs It is helpful to capture costs using a framework to ensure we account for all necessary items. As a general rule, project costs should be viewed from an “all-up” view – that is, what the cost to the entire organization would be. People • What type of internal resources does the project need? • All internal resources performing work on the project (including IT, Business Resources, HR/Training, Legal, Finance, Marketing) need to be included • Does the project need external resources? • Consultants, Contractors, Temps – ensure we receive a Statement of Work from the vendor • Note if you would need external help to backfill for business line positions and include this cost • Include Travel and Incidental Costs such as mobile phones and fees • Use 130% of salary as a fully loaded rate, which includes incentives and benefits • $50/hour is an average rate that can be used in lieu of actual salaries • If there will be a need for severance as a direct result of your project, these costs must be included in the overall project costs • Ongoing FTE costs such as compensation or external FTE costs that will continue after project completion Process • Training costs • Include materials (documents, flip charts, projectors), room rentals, meals, travel • Policy and procedure documentation (binders, job aids, forms) • Marketing brochures and materials • Off-site meetings (rooms, virtual meetings)
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Types of Costs It is helpful to capture costs using a framework to ensure we account for all necessary items. As a general rule, project costs should be viewed from an “all-up” view – that is, what the cost to the organization as a whole would be. Technology • New Hardware purchases such as Servers, Infrastructure-related items • Note that it is not an incremental project cost if you are leasing equipment such as PC’s or monitors to replace existing equipment • Software purchases • Licenses • Ongoing maintenance Infrastructure • Space: existing or is there a build-out required? Your Facilities Team will provide these estimates • These costs could include: build-out, restacks, moving costs, equipment purchases, lease terminations, asset write-offs • Are there any remote team members that require any additional infrastructure to participate in activities
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Capital Costs “Capitalizing future benefits as assets and amortizing the usefulness over time matches economic benefits realized with the periods in which an entity realizes those benefits” (FDIC, Capitalization of Internal-Use Software Development Costs, 3/02) • What This Really Means • Capitalizing technology costs allows the entity to more accurately reflect expenses in the appropriate time period by spreading out the initial cost of the hardware/software over the useful life of the asset the project creates • This ultimately improves earnings in the current period • However, the flipside is that we ultimately depreciate the costs after the project is complete, so while the current income statement looks great, we will see these costs after the project goes in-service • How Do We Know What To Capitalize? • The estimated useful life is more than one year, and the costs > $2,000, • Increased functionality (e.g., relates to upgrades or enhancements) or new functionality, • Software is developed or modified solely to meet the entity’s internal needs, • No substantive plan exists or is being developed to market the software externally, • The costs are incurred during the Application Development Stage, which only include: • External direct costs of materials and services consumed in developing or obtaining internal-use computer software; • Payroll and payroll related costs (e.g., benefits) for employees who are directly associated with and devote time to the software project, including time spent installing, programming, configuring, coding, and testing the software; • Costs to obtain or develop software to convert old data to the new system; • Authorization from appropriate level of management is obtained • Probable that the project will be completed and the software will be used to perform the function intended.
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Non-Capital Costs • What Not To Capitalize • Preliminary Project Stage – The decision making stage in which the conceptual formulation and evaluation of alternatives, determination of existence of needed technology, and final selection of alternatives are performed. This includes both internal and external resources used in the process. • Post Implementation/Operational Stage – Normal operating costs of software, including training and application maintenance costs. • Costs that are not usually capitalized for the development of computer software are: • General and administrative costs as well as overhead costs • Project Management Costs; unless during Execute stage • Manual Data Conversion/Recoding • Training • Application maintenance • Licenses, other than the initial license
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Types of Benefits Expense reduction benefits are the easiest to capture and track as data is readily available and can be directly tied back to a cost center expense statement. Note that any benefit besides the Cost Reduction benefits do not count in calculating the NPV, IRR, and Payback on the CBA as they are not hard dollar savings. • Cost Reduction • Action that results in a direct and easily identifiable cost reduction to the Bank • Examples would be: FTE reductions, Contractor/Temp Help reductions, Occupancy, System Replacement/Obsolescence, Printing/Supplies usage reduction • Efficiency Improvements/Other Improvements • Action that results in a “soft save” that is not a direct cost reduction • Examples include: increased capacity to handle call/loan volumes, overtime avoidance, increased customer satisfaction • Cost Avoidance • Action that results in a “soft save” that is not being incurred currently, but has the potential to be incurred if the project does not take place • Examples include: FTE that “would not have to be hired”, regulatory fines, decreased capacity to handle call/loan volumes, increased fees • Data Needs • Average Comp and Benefits per FTE • Number of FTE affected • Efficiency % gained • Occupancy • Costs by vendor • Fees/Fines/Supplies
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Types of Benefits Revenue benefits are the hardest and most complicated to track as the variables of rate and market, coupled with the sheer volume of loans, affect the revenue component much more than our expenses • Revenue Enhancements • Increased volumes as a result of a market share growth or new market project • Increased fees as a result of new business opportunity • Gain on sale of loans as a result of more efficient process • Hedge savings as a result of a more efficient process • Data Needs and Source • Volumes • Revenue Per Loan • Profit Per Loan • Gain on Sales • Fees
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Project Financial Control Tool / Cost-Benefit Analysis So, what do we do now with all of this wonderful data we’ve gathered? • It’s now time to analyze the financial merits of the project by using the Project Financial Control Tool (PFCT) • The output of the tool will be a robust Cost-Benefit Analysis that will provide the Bank-standard metrics to properly gauge the financial risk of the project • This section will not attempt to provide detailed training on the PFCT, it will simply highlight some key areas of focus that have not been discussed earlier in this document • Assumptions • Showing the detail behind the numbers used in the analysis of the project • “Big 3” Metrics • Net Present Value • Internal Rate of Return • Payback Period • Last, we will describe the types of questions one should be prepared for when reviewing the financial analysis with Executive Management
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Project Financial Control Tool / Cost-Benefit Analysis • Assumptions • The roadmap of the Cost-Benefit Analysis, but often not documented clearly • Clearly documenting the cost and benefit assumptions allows all users of the PFCT, at any time, to understand the rationale behind the numbers that make up the analysis • A simple example is shown below, but the essential elements to document are the data source, description and the steps of the calculation • Supporting schedules should be inserted in worksheets within the PFCT file and linked to the appropriate cell within the PFCT. • Please also document “soft” or non-tangible costs as well as non-financial assumptions such as timing and dependencies to help fully understand all risk associated with the project • An example of soft benefits would be “a 3rd Party vendor can fulfill these loans more efficiently than Bank A, leading to increased customer satisfaction” • An example of a timing/dependency would be “dependent on the successful integration of the sales platform before pilot stage”
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Project Financial Control Tool / Cost-Benefit Analysis • The Big Three: Net Present Value (NPV), Internal Rate of Return (IRR) and Payback • These three metrics, always taken collectively, allow a quick and consistent barometer of a project’s potential financial worth to the organization • These metrics are also the only visibility that senior management has into a program/project • The metrics have to be taken collectively as each metric alone has limitations that are mitigated by reviewing them as a group • Net Present Value (Target = positive $) • Defined as the sum of the present value of cash inflows subtracted by the present value of cash outflows, while adjusting for inflation and cost of capital • Used to measure the profitability of a project, it essentially tells us the value of a dollar today versus the value of that same dollar in the future, after taking inflation and return (discount rate) into account • If the NPV is greater than zero than the project should be accepted, and less than zero, the project should be rejected • Internal Rate of Return (Target = 20%) • Defined simply as the true interest yield expected from a project, similar to how you would view the performance of one of your personal investments • Also will hear a term called “Hurdle Rate” in conjunction with IRR • Hurdle Rate is the minimum return on investment that the entitiy will accept on a project, hence, we want ours to be above this level (current hurdle rate is 13.6%) • Payback Period (Target = 1.5 years) • Defined as the amount of time it takes to recover the initial cash outlay of a project
Project Finance Handbook – Planning: Executive Review Meetings • Read the project documentation to fully understand the scope of the project to assess whether appropriate costs and benefits are included in the Financial Control Tool. • People, Process, Technology, and Infrastructure costs have been identified • Is supporting documentation present for costs or benefits • Ensure your inputs are sourced and documented • Have benefits been signed off by the Business Owner and Sponsor • Do identified benefits reflect a partial year in first year, based on go live date • Are the costs and benefits included in the plan or forecast In order to help facilitate the review of your CBA and ultimately keep the approval process moving, below are some high-level things to think about when preparing your project financials
Line items are the key subgroups of the project budget and can be modified depending on the project The report compares current month, year-to-date and project-to-date actuals with their respective budgets Trend graphs provide a quick visual snapshot of a project’s financial status Monthly g/l and line item details are provided as backup to the summary presented here Resource time data is included separately to isolate any resource variances Project Finance Handbook - Control: Cost Reporting So now the project is humming along, on track and on target to solve all of the world’s problems. Then someone asks how much money has been spent. Ut-oh. Good news is there is an answer! • The sample report shown on the next page is an example of a report that was used in a variety of $100M capital projects.
