Actual Sales for January Through April Are Shown Below Use Exponential Smoothing with α =

Essay

Actual sales for January through April are shown below. $$\begin{array} { l l l l } \text { Observation } & \text { Month } & \text { Actual Sales } ( A ) & \text { Forecasted Sales } ( F ) \\1 & \text { January } & 18 \\2 & \text { February } & 23 \\3 & \text { March } & 20 \\4 & \text { April } & 16 \\5 & \text { May } &\end{array}$$ Use exponential smoothing with α = .2 to calculate smoothed averages and forecast sales for May from the above data. Assume the forecast for the initial period (January) is 18. Show all of your computations.
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