An equity analyst needs to select 2 stocks for the upcoming year and rank these securities in terms of their investment potential. If the analyst has narrowed down the list of potential stocks to 5, in how many ways can she choose and rank her top 2 picks?
Options:
(A) 20
(B) 30
(C) 10
(D) 40
(E) 80 Stream of consciousness first, then make a decision:
Number of ways of choosing 2 stocks = 5C2
Number of ways of ranking the chosen stocks = 2!
Hence total ways of chosing and ranking = 5C2 * 2! = 20
Thus, the answer is (A).