General American Investors Company, a closed-end regulated investment management company, invests primarily in medium- and high-quality stocks. Jim Campbell is studying the asset value per share for this company and would like to forecast this variable for the remaining quarters of 1996. The data are presented in Table P-12.
Evaluate the ability to forecast the asset value per share variable of the following forecasting methods: naive, moving average, and exponential smoothing. When you compare techniques, take into consideration that the actual asset value per share for the second quarter of 1996 was 26.47. Write a report for Jim indicating which method he should use and why.

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TABLE P-12 General American Investors Company Assets per Share, 1985-1996 Quarter Year 16.98 18.4717.63 2065 21.95 23.85 2044 22.75 2394 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 19.29 16.70 24.84 9.19 189717.03 22.89 1804 21.41 21.50 25.05 20.33 20.60 25.33 26.06 27.44 25.87 24.96 23.32 22.67 25.68 28.89 28.71 27.61 24.08 25.41 30.60 28.56 24.75 22.31 23.94 26.69 22.61