Publications

July 2010 (Revised March 2016)
Case

MacroMarkets LLC

By: Robin Greenwood and Luis M. Viceira

MacroMarkets co-founder and CEO Samuel Masucci III is meeting with a strategic partner for his firm. Co-founded with Yale University Professor Robert Shiller, MacroMarkets' main innovation is the "MacroShare," which allows investors to take long or short, levered or... View Details

Keywords: Macroeconomics; Financial Instruments; Financial Markets; Investment Funds; Investment Portfolio; Innovation and Invention; Risk Management; Product Positioning; Demand and Consumers; Financial Services Industry

17 Mar 2011
Research & Ideas

Harvard Business School Faculty Comment on Crisis in Japan

As Japan continues to come to grips with the devastating toll exacted by the earthquake within its borders, the aftershocks are just beginning to be felt within the global economy. Here, several Harvard Business School faculty members share their views View Details

Keywords: Re: Multiple Faculty

February 2003 (Revised March 2007)
Case

Safe to Say at Prudential Financial

By: Amy C. Edmondson and Corey B. Hajim

The CEO initiated a cultural change process at Prudential Financial to support a major business reorientation. Prudential, historically a privately held ("mutual") insurance company, went public in 2001. The cultural change was intended to prepare the organization to... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Risk and Uncertainty; Private Ownership; Going Public; Transformation; Organizational Culture

February 2010
Case

Amyris Biotechnologies: Commercializing Biofuel

By: Gary P. Pisano and Alison Berkley Wagonfeld

In 2009, Amyris Biotechnologies was building a plant in Brazil that used synthetic biology to convert sugarcane into both renewable fuels and renewable chemicals. The Amyris' marketing team was investigating the commercial interest for both types of products, while the... View Details

Keywords: Renewable Energy; Chemicals; Risk Management; Product Marketing; Product Development; Production; Environmental Sustainability; Commercialization; Biotechnology Industry; Brazil

14 Sep 2007
Research & Ideas

How to Profit from Scarcity

company. It wasn't just direct sales of these two products that benefited from the scarcity illusion, however: The heavy crowds drove sales of related products in Apple stores and bookstores during a relatively slow sales month. But there... View Details

Keywords: by John Quelch; Consumer Products; Advertising

2012
Working Paper

Reaching for Yield in the Bond Market

By: Bo Becker and Victoria Ivashina

Reaching-for-yield—the propensity to buy riskier assets in order to achieve higher yields—is believed to be an important factor contributing to the credit cycle. This paper analyses this phenomenon in the corporate bond market. Specifically, we show evidence for... View Details

Keywords: Fixed Income; Reaching For Yield; Financial Intermediation; Insurance Companies; Insurance; Bonds; Assets; Risk Management; Investment Return; Investment Portfolio; Insurance Industry

SSRN

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Fall 2013
Article

Engaging Supply Chains in Climate Change

By: Chonnikarn Fern Jira and Michael W. Toffel

Suppliers are increasingly being asked to share information about their vulnerability to climate change and their strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Their responses vary widely. We theorize and empirically identify several factors associated with suppliers... View Details

Keywords: Knowledge Sharing; Motivation and Incentives; Risk Management; Climate Change; Supply Chain Management; Environmental Sustainability

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27 Mar 2018
First Look

First Look at New Research, March 27, 2018

self-employment have the option to transition to paid work. If there is initial uncertainty about entrepreneurial earnings, this option increases the expected lifetime value of self-employment relative to pay in a single year. This paper... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

03 Sep 2009
What Do You Think?

Are Retention Bonuses Worth the Investment?

Summing Up What is the time and place for retention bonuses? Retention bonuses have their time and place but have to be used sparingly, according to many respondents to this month's column. Others were not... View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

20 Jan 2015
First Look

First Look: January 20

And by adding more customers, MasterCard potentially could also grow its bottom line. Financial inclusion raised questions for MasterCard. Was the management time and attention well spent given the low... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

October 1998 (Revised April 2001)
Case

Preview Travel (B)

By: William A. Sahlman and Nicole Tempest

Supplements the (A) case. View Details

Keywords: Risk and Uncertainty; Business Model; Initial Public Offering; Internet and the Web; Business Plan; Capital; Financial Strategy; Travel Industry; United States

21 Aug 2006
Research & Ideas

How Europe Wrote the Rules of Global Finance

financial crises of 1997 and 1998. Today, the IMF is very cautious about encouraging countries to liberalize, and indeed generally IMF officials offer developing countries warnings about the serious View Details

Keywords: by Ann Cullen

January 2013 (Revised April 2017)
Supplement

Maxum Petroleum, Inc.

By: W. Carl Kester

Maxum seeks an oil-price hedging strategy that yields substantial cash during oil price spikes, is affordable under ordinary circumstances, and is easily managed. It is striving to avoid a repeat of the challenging situation encountered in 2008 when spiking oil prices... View Details

Keywords: Hedging; Options; Commodities; Credit Derivatives and Swaps; Risk Management; Futures and Commodity Futures; Financial Strategy; Volatility

April 2011
Case

Hermitage's Russian Quandary (A)

By: Eric Werker, Ray Fisman and Lauren Weber

In June 2007, the offices of Russian hedge fund Hermitage Capital were raided by Moscow police; in the months that followed, Hermitage founder Bill Browder found himself banned from Russia and fending off efforts to expropriate the fund's Russian assets. This case... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Private Equity; Investment; Law Enforcement; Laws and Statutes; Crisis Management; Risk Management; Business and Government Relations; Financial Services Industry; Moscow