The Cost of Capital Professional is the name chosen for BVR’s new, simple, independent service for estimating the cost of equity. The new platform is designed to bring more professional judgment and common sense back into the process, which has become too much of a complex “black box” of applied mathematics. It supports the build-up method and CAPM calculations for any valuation date and will be available in early November on a free-trial basis using CRSP market return data up to Sept. 30, 2018. Later, the platform will be available with a subscription and will contain FY2018 data and beyond. New data will be added in March 2019.

More flexibility: “The new platform is designed to bring back flexibility to the process,” says Ron Seigneur (Seigneur Gustafson LLP CPAs), one of the developers of the Cost of Capital Professional. “We give you the raw materials, and you use your professional judgment to shape the final result. You are not steered into a particular way of doing something. The platform will have certain default options, but you have the freedom to decide whether or not to use those options. We’re not using enough common sense anymore when it comes to cost of capital, so this platform brings more of that back into the process.”

Seigneur and Dr. Michael Crain (Florida Atlantic University), a co-developer of the platform, will conduct a free webinar on November 20 to discuss the new platform and the thinking behind it. They also gave an interview to Business Valuation Update, and you can read it if you click here. You can sign up for the free trial of the Cost of Capital Professional if you click here. BVR is looking for user feedback during the free trial period.