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July 2015
Article

The Impact of Corporate Social Responsibility on Investment Recommendations: Analysts' Perceptions and Shifting Institutional Logics

By: Ioannis Ioannou and George Serafeim

We explore the impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) ratings on sell-side analysts' assessments of firms' future financial performance. We suggest that when analysts perceive CSR as an agency cost, due to the prevalence of an agency logic, they produce... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility; Analysts; Investment Recommendations; Sustainability; Institutional Logics; Environment; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Investment; Corporate Governance; United States

15 Aug 2007
Op-Ed

3 Steps to Reduce Financial System Risk

expertise among the spaghetti bowl of supervisory bodies; second, encourage rating agencies to improve their modeling of new and complex derivative products; and third, induce new investors to evaluate the... View Details

Keywords: by Mohamed El-Erian; Financial Services; Banking

Research Summary

Knowledge Spillovers and Growth

Professor King and colleagues investigate the role of knowledge spillovers and externalities in the dramatic disagglomeration and growth of the advertising agency industry following World War II. High demand, low wages, and externalities associated with clusters of... View Details

21 May 2012
Research & Ideas

OSHA Inspections: Protecting Employees or Killing Jobs?

killing jobs at a time when the United States can ill afford to lose them. Few regulatory agencies have a more direct effect on businesses than the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the federal View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

03 Nov 2010
Working Paper Summaries

How Did Increased Competition Affect Credit Ratings?

Keywords: by Bo Becker & Todd Milbourn; Financial Services

13 Jul 2007
Working Paper Summaries

Economic Catastrophe Bonds

Keywords: by Joshua D. Coval, Jakub W. Jurek & Erik Stafford; Financial Services

21 Jul 2009
First Look

First Look: July 21

rating agencies. We use the rise of a third ratings agency to examine competition and reputation. Consistent with Klein and Leffler (1981), competition leads to lower quality... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

25 Aug 2017
Op-Ed

Op-Ed: After Charlottesville, Where Does a CEO's Responsibility Lie?

Trump, the demographics of opposition to the president put unique pressure on business leaders. He is astoundingly unpopular with the young. In August, among adults under 35, Trump had a disapproval rating of 62 percent with only 22... View Details

Keywords: by Gautam Mukunda

12 Nov 2014
News

Whalen: Dow Should Give Money Back to Shareholders

April 1999 (Revised June 1999)
Case

1-800 Buy Ireland

By: Willis M. Emmons III, Adele S. Cooper and J. Richard Lenane

After decades of poor economic performance, the Irish government adopted major changes in economic policy in 1987. By the end of the 1990s, Ireland's real GDP growth rate of almost 10% per year exceeds that of all member nations of the European Union (EU). A key... View Details

Keywords: Integration; Development Economics; Supply and Industry; Policy; Foreign Direct Investment; Growth and Development Strategy; Macroeconomics; Republic of Ireland

January 2021 (Revised May 2021)
Case

Delta Air Lines: Navigating the COVID-19 Storm

By: Ted Berk and Ryan Flamerich

This case examines Delta Air Lines’ response as demand for its services plummeted in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a focus on the company’s funding needs and capital structure. Following a series of initial actions, the company’s cash “burn” had reduced from... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19; Health Pandemics; Financial Condition; Capital Structure; Crisis Management; Risk Management; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Air Transportation Industry

04 Oct 2011
First Look

First Look: October 4

on reputation. We conclude with a more general discussion of the contributions of our framework to understanding managerial practice in emerging-market regulatory contexts. Read the paper: http://www.people.hbs.edu/cmarquis/Regulatory_Uncertainty_CMR_Final.pdf The... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

fall 2008
Article

The Intermediation of Financial Risks: Evolution in the Catastrophe Reinsurance Market

By: Kenneth A. Froot

In this paper, I provide evidence concerning the imperfections in the reinsurance market. I try to get at some of the root causes of these imperfections, e.g., the behavior of ratings firms and the agency problems associated with the corporate form of ownership. I also... View Details

Keywords: Catastrophe Risk; Corporate Finance; Banking And Insurance; Hedging; Banking; Financial Markets; Insurance; Policy; Risk Management; Natural Disasters; Cost of Capital; Asset Pricing; Insurance Industry

Find at Harvard

November 2006 (Revised March 2007)
Case

Goodyear and the Threat of Government Tire Grading

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee, Dennis A. Yao and Elizabeth Raabe

In the spring of 1977, Goodyear CEO Charles J. Pilliod Jr. was looking at an internal report on government and legal events relevant to the tire industry. Two items caught his attention. First, he noticed that an industry suit to block the government's proposed system... View Details

Keywords: Competitive Advantage; Lawsuits and Litigation; Auto Industry; Rubber Industry; United States

March 2008 (Revised April 2009)
Case

Eliot Spitzer: Pushing Wall Street to Reform

By: Rawi Abdelal, Rafael Di Tella and Jonathan Schlefer

New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer faced a decision about how to stop wrongdoing committed by major Wall Street firms during the Internet boom. The equities analysts of Merrill Lynch and other Wall Street firms were charged with objectively advising retail... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Decisions; Financial Institutions; Stocks; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Laws and Statutes; Lawsuits and Litigation; Conflict of Interests; Internet; Financial Services Industry; United States

December 2013 (Revised March 2024)
Case

Breaking Bad (the Rules): Argentina Defaults, Inflates (and Grows), 1997–2015

By: Rafael Di Tella and Fernanda Miguel

In late October 2011, after losing 1 billion of dollar reserves in one month, the Argentine government began imposing a series of currency controls, limiting the ability to buy foreign currency. As of October 2011, Argentina's tax collection agency AFIP had been... View Details

Keywords: Default; Inflation; Inflation and Deflation; Currency; Governance Controls; Argentina

Article

The Economics of Structured Finance

By: Joshua D. Coval, Jakub W. Jurek and Erik Stafford

This paper investigates the spectacular rise and fall of structured finance. The essence of structured finance activities is the pooling of economic assets like loans, bonds, and mortgages, and the subsequent issuance of a prioritized capital structure of claims, known... View Details

Keywords: Financial Crisis; Asset Management; Debt Securities; Investment; Risk Management; Behavior