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Discounted cash flow (DCF) calculations are used to adjust the value of money received in the future. In order to calculate DCFs, you will need to identify a situation in which money will be received at a later date or dates in one or more installments. DCFs are commonly used for things like investments in securities or companies that will provide cash flows over a number of years. Alternately, a business might use DCFs to estimate the return from an investment in production equipment, for example. In order to calculate DCFs, you will need a definable set of future cash flows and know the date(s) that you will receive those cash flows. To calculate the present value of future cash flows, you will first need to know their future values. With fixed payments like annuities or bond coupon payments, these cash flows are set in stone; however, with cash flows from company operations or project returns you will need to estimate future cash flows, which is an entire calculation in itself. While it may seem that you could just project current growth trends over the next set of years, the proper calculation of future cash flows will involve much more.  For example, you might include industry trends, market conditions, and operational developments in cash flow projections for a company. Even then it may not be even close to accurate when the cash flows actually arrive.  For simplicity, though, let's say you are considering an investment that will return you a set amount at the end each year for three years. Specifically, you will receive $1,000 the first year, $2,000 the second year, and $3,000 the third year. The investment costs $5,000 to buy, and you want to know if it is a good investment based on the present value of the money you will receive. The discount rate is used to "discount" the future cash flow value back to its present value. The discount rate, sometimes also called the personal rate of return, represents the amount that is "lost" each year due to inflation and missed investment opportunities. You might choose to use the return on a safe investment, plus a risk premium.  For example, imagine that instead of investing in the investment providing future cash flows, you could invest your money in treasuries earning a guaranteed return of 2 percent per year. In addition, you expect to be compensated for taking the risk of loss of your money, say a risk premium of 7 percent. Your discount rate would be the sum of these two figures, which is 9 percent. This represents the rate of return you would earn by investing your money elsewhere, such as in the stock market. The only other variable you'll need once you have the discount rate and cash flow future values is the dates at which those cash flows will be received. This should be pretty self-explanatory if you've purchased an investment, have a set of structured payouts, or have created a model for a company's future cash flows; however, make sure to clearly record the cash flows with their associated years. Creating a chart may help you organize your ideas. For example, you might organize the example payouts as follows:  Year 1: $1,000 Year 2: $2,000 Year 3: $3,000
Identify a situation in which you would need to discount cash flows. Determine the value of future cash flows. Calculate your discount rate. Figure out the number of compounding periods.