Publications

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2013
Working Paper

Heterogeneous Technology Diffusion and Ricardian Trade Patterns

By: William R. Kerr

This study tests the importance of Ricardian technology differences for international trade. The empirical analysis has three comparative advantages: including emerging and advanced economies, isolating panel variation regarding the link between productivity and... View Details

Keywords: Exports; Comparative Advantage; Technological Transfer; Innovation; Networks; Patents; Residency; Technology Adoption; Trade; Research and Development; Immigration; United States

SSRN

March 2003 (Revised September 2004)
Case

Worker Rights and Global Trade: The U.S.-Cambodia Bilateral Textile Trade Agreement

Examines the political and economic dimensions of the campaign to improve workers' rights around the world through the inclusion of labor standards in international trade agreements. The U.S.-Cambodia Textile Trade Agreement was the first agreement of its kind to link... View Details

Keywords: Trade; Agreements and Arrangements; Rights; Working Conditions; Globalization; Consumer Products Industry; Cambodia; United States

November 2013 (Revised January 2015)
Case

Restructuring JAL

By: Malcolm Baker, Adi Sunderam, Nobuo Sato and Akiko Kanno

Hideo Seto, the recently appointed chairman of the investment committee of the Enterprise Turnaround Initiative Corporation, must decide whether to push JAL group, Japan's largest airline, into bankruptcy or to act as a sponsor in an out-of-court restructuring. The... View Details

Keywords: Bankruptcy; Costs Of Financial Distress; Cost vs Benefits; Air Transportation; Restructuring; Capital Structure; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Air Transportation Industry; Japan; United States

December 1997 (Revised March 1998)
Case

Mid Ocean Limited: Trading Catastrophe Index Options

By: Kenneth A. Froot and Markus Mullarkey

An insurance industry executive must evaluate the potential of a set of newly-offered catastrophe insurance derivatives. The background addresses the roles of traditional reinsurance and securitization efforts in providing risk transfer and risk financing in the "cat"... View Details

Keywords: Commodity Market; Derivatives; Insurance; Capital Markets; Natural Disasters; Risk Management; Financial Management; Financial Strategy; Performance Evaluation; Insurance Industry; Bermuda

12 Apr 2015
News

Actively managed exchange traded funds are the NextShares big thing

2009
Chapter

The Sultan's Republic: Jealousy of Trade and Oriental Despotism in Paolo Mattia Doria

By: Sophus A. Reinert

Article

Do the Right Firms Survive Bankruptcy?

By: Samuel Antill

In U.S. Chapter 11 bankruptcy cases, firms are either reorganized, acquired, or liquidated. I show that decisions to liquidate often reduce creditor recovery, costing creditors billions of dollars every year. I exploit the within-district random assignment of... View Details

Keywords: Bankruptcy; Bankruptcy Reorganization; Recovery Rate; Structural Estimation; Roy Model; 363 Sales; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms

SSRN

Find at Harvard

07 May 2025
News

3G Capital Unfazed By Trade War With China In $9 Billion Skechers Deal

01 Aug 2018
What Do You Think?

Are Free Trade and Free Markets Quaint Ideas From the Past?

AvigatorPhotographer Are Free Trade Notions Repeatedly Victim to Short-Term Thinking? Free trade and free markets are concepts to which many of us, given our training in... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

2025
Working Paper

Navigating Choppy Waters: How U.S. Trade Policy Uncertainty Affects Small Businesses

By: David Atkin, Zoë Cullen and Ebehi Iyoha

This paper explores the impact of recent changes in the US trade policy environment on small businesses. Drawing on a survey of more than 4,000 small businesses conducted between March 22 and 31, 2025, we examine firms’ knowledge, expectations, and decisions during... View Details

Keywords: Trade; Risk and Uncertainty; Government Legislation; Globalization; International Relations; Small Business

01 Oct 1996
News

Trading Up — Kenneth D. Brody (MBA 1971)

White House, however, public service soon called. In 1993, the President appointed Brody to be chairman and president of the government's trade financing agency, the Export-Import Bank of the United States.... View Details

Keywords: Garry Emmons

26 Feb 2018
News

Teaching Farmers New Tricks of the Trade

Erik Malmstrom (MBA 2012) is general manager of crop marketing for the Farmers Business Network in California. In this video, he describes how the organization is helping transform the agriculture space... View Details

April 2019 (Revised December 2021)
Case

Sears: The Demise of an American Icon

By: Kristin Mugford and Sarah L. Abbott

In 2019, ESL Investments’ $5.2 billion offer to purchase Sears Holdings out of Chapter 11 bankruptcy, was accepted, despite opposition from the company's unsecured creditors and other parties. ESL, which was led by Eddie Lampert, had acquired a stake in Sears following... View Details

Keywords: Bankruptcy; Reorganization; Bonds; Restructuring; Business Divisions; Transformation; Fairness; Borrowing and Debt; Credit; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Corporate Governance; Motivation and Incentives; Retail Industry; United States

2025
Working Paper

Pulp Friction: The Value of Quantity Contracts in Decentralized Markets

By: Olivier Darmouni, Simon Essig Aberg and Juha Tolvanen

Firms in decentralized markets often trade using quantity contracts, agreements that specify quantity prior to the point of sale. These contracts are valuable because they provide quantity assurance, as trading frictions could prevent a buyer and seller from matching... View Details

Keywords: Decentralized Markets; Trading Frictions; Market Structure; Transaction Costs; Contracts; Market Transactions; Pulp and Paper Industry

SSRN

February 2001
Case

Free Trade vs. Protectionism: The Great Corn-Laws Debate

By: David A. Moss, Kevin P. Brennan, Matthew B. Gorin and Marian Lee

Examines the extended conflict between free traders and protectionists in nineteenth-century Britain. It culminates with Prime Minister Robert Peel's decision at the end of 1845 about whether to repeal the Corn Laws, a series of acts that had protected British... View Details

Keywords: Conflict of Interests; Trade; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; Government Legislation; Change Management; Competitive Advantage; Plant-Based Agribusiness; Market Entry and Exit; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Great Britain

April 2022
Case

The First Opium War and Global Free Trade

By: Jeremy Friedman and Allison Lazarus

The First Opium War (1839-1842) symbolized the peak of the era of European imperialism, with a political and cultural legacy that remains potent to this day. The British Empire, “acquired in a fit of absent-mindedness” as one observer famously claimed, seemed to be... View Details

Keywords: Imperialism; Narcotics; Importing; History; Globalized Markets and Industries; Trade; Social Issues

January 5, 2012
Article

Internet Protocol Numbers and the American Registry for Internet Numbers: Suggested Guidance for Bankruptcy Trustees, Debtors-in-Possession, and Receivers

By: Stephen Ryan, Benjamin Edelman and Matthew Martel

Bankruptcy trustees, debtors-in-possession, and receivers are seeing an increase in efforts to sell Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, also referred to "IP Numbers." IP Numbers are the unique numeric identifiers associated with computers connected to the Internet. While... View Details

Keywords: Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Internet; Sales; Value; Policy; Contracts