Re: "Given that the bookings figure is a trailing 3 month average,
and given the very large drop in the average for April but the very small
drop for May, I think that forces May's raw bookings to be much larger than
April's."
Nice try, but unfortunately there are not enough data to draw that
conclusion. Your table has six unknowns and only four known pieces of
data. That means that you could arbitrarily select any two numbers
for April and May raw bookings, and you could always find a set of
numbers for the preceding months that would make the math come out right.
Besides your scenario for raw data (reproduced in the second column below),
here are two of the many scenarios that would have May bookings below April:
Dwayanu's Alternative Alternative
Month Raw Bookings 3-Mth Avg Raw Bookings Raw Bookings #2
--------- ------------ --------- ------------ ---------------
Dec 2,000 1,997 1,950
Jan 1,600 2,425 2,125
Feb 1,200 1,600 378 725
Mar 800 1,200 797 750
Apr 175 725 1,000 700
May 1,125 700 303 650
Now, before you tell me that bookings were unlikely to drop by a factor
of six from January to February, I should point out that they were equally
unlikely to jump by a factor of six from April to May.
It is simply not possible to know from the published data whether May's raw
bookings were higher, lower, or the same as April. |
