DCF - how to consider investments?

Hi everyone,

It seems that I forgot all that I knew some years ago :frowning: fortunately, you guys are here to help :wink:

I have to model a quite simple (and overly simplistic) project: the company starts operations with 70 equity and 30 debt, invests all 100 into buses that then spit revenue for 10 years. I need to calculate project NPV and IRR and the same for the equity holders.

So I calculated FCFF and FCFE for all years and then calculated IRR for equity holders as (-70) in year 0 (=beginning of year 1 but not discounted) then relevant FCFE in years 1-10, same for project IRR.

Now the issue I face is that if the company only invests in the buses at the end of year 1, then my FCFE and FCFF for year 1 consider the -100 cash flow from investments. But if these investments are made right at the start of the year (year 0), then it doesnโ€™t show up in the DCF, so my IRRs are way higher.

I intuitively feel that investing in year 0 makes complete sense, but I still canโ€™t figure out why the IRR impact is so huge. Or should I consider the -100 investment somewhere in FCFE in year 1?

Not sure Iโ€™m being clear, but hopefully you can help.

Thanks!