CHAPTER 7 B – 1
30. The IRR is the interest rate that makes the NPV of the project equal to zero. So, the IRR of the project
is:
0 = $50,000 – $61,000/(1 + IRR) + $41,000/(1 + IRR)2
Even though it appears there are two IRRs, a spreadsheet, financial calculator, or trial and error will
not give an answer. The reason is that there is no real IRR for this set of cash flows. If you examine
the IRR equation, what we are really doing is solving for the roots of the equation. Going back to high
school algebra, in this problem we are solving a quadratic equation. In case you don’t remember, the
quadratic equation is: