You will be using descriptive statistics to analyze an equity traded fund (ETF) using Microsoft
Excel. You must incorporate economic theory and financial indicators in your analysis.
• You must collect your data from the FRED (https://fred.stlouisfed.org/) and
yahoo.finance.com.
• The paper must contain between 1200-1700 words
• Use at least 5 references to support your economic theory (highlight economic theory)
• Include a works cited page for your references (MLA format).
• Your assignment must be divided into three parts.
• Round your results to two decimal places when possible. If not, explain why.
• Use at least 30 observations for each variable.
• Your variables must be in the same format (i.e., Month, Quarter, Year)
• You must analyze your results.
• Compute, analyze, and explain the following results from your data.
Your paper must include the following sections:
Part I: Introduce your thesis, including an economic background for your ETF. What makes this
ETF important in today’s market?
Your economic background must include theory derived from any undergraduate economics
course (i.e. A decrease in the marginal propensity to consume (MPC) could lead to a decrease in
consumer discretionary).
Part II: Present and analyze your results using one year of data, include the following:
a. Describe the data visually and explain why you chose a certain type of chart to present
the data from the economic indicator and how it relates to the ETF you chose (line
chart, bar chart, pie chart, scatterplot, or other).
b. Complete a measure of center test for the ETF (mean, median, mode, trimmed mean)
c. Complete a measure of variability for the ETF (range, variance, standard deviation, mean
absolute deviation)
d. Divide the ETF holdings by a financial metric (i.e. Price-to-Earnings ratio) into quartiles.
Explain how this metric will help us analyze the data.
e. Find the covariance between two stocks in your ETF and calculate the correlation.
f. Find of skewness and kurtosis of the two stocks in the ETF.
Part III: Summarize and draw any conclusions on the topic.
a. What can we say about the correlation or lack of correlation between the two
companies in the ETF?
b. What does the financial metric say about the ETF?
c. Did the ETF underperform or outperform the SP500? (price return, total return, returnto-risk)
• The paper must be submitted as a .PDF file in Blackboard>Project>Turnitin
• Double space your paper
• No late submissions will be accepted for any reason, including technical, personal, or other
• Your paper must be your original work. If it is not, you will automatically fail the assignment.
• You may not submit work you have presented in other courses (I will use Turnitin software
to test the originality of your paper). If you submit plagiarized work, you will fail the
assignment
• No late submissions will be accepted for any reason. See course calendar for due date
• Paper grades will only be transferred to Blackboard after the “graded by” date. See course
calendar