Underwriters - Publications - Faculty & Research

Research Summary

The Role of Financial and Information Intermediaries in the Capital Markets

Hutton's research investigates the role of financial analysts and short sellers in the pricing of equity securities. Recently, Hutton examines (with Patricia Dechow and Richard Sloan) the role of sell-side analysts' earnings forecasts in the pricing of common equity... View Details

August 2019
Case

The Allstate Corporation, 2019

By: John R. Wells and Benjamin Weinstock

In July 2019, Allstate, the United States’ number-three property and casualty (P/C) insurer, released its second-quarter earnings, which reported first-half revenues of $22.1 billion, up 11.4% year-over-year. Shareholders cheered the top-line growth, but P/C premiums... View Details

Keywords: Insurance Companies; Strategic Analysis; Strategic Change; Insurance; Strategy; Strategic Planning; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Competitive Strategy; Insurance Industry; North America

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12 Apr 2022
Book

Racism, Colonialism, and Britain's Legacy of Violence

endured and is underwriting Britain’s belief that the tiny island nation is a giant ready to stake its historically informed claim to the world. In no other contemporary nation-state does imperial nationalism endure with such explicit... View Details

Keywords: by Avery Forman

09 Apr 2018
Sharpening Your Skills

The Dark Side of Performance Bonuses

dark side of employee motivation programs: When Good Incentives Lead to Bad Decisions Leading up to the financial crisis, bank loan officers were often incentivized to approve sketchy applications. But researchers discovered the incentives did more than motivate View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

21 Feb 2023
Research & Ideas

Are Your Employees Passing Up Incentives? Try Promoting the Programs More

billions of dollars on wellness programs each year, underwriting gym memberships and offering other perks, yet analyses find only a third or so of employees at US companies take advantage of these programs. Over half of American workers... View Details

Keywords: by Scott Van Voorhis

10 Oct 2011
Research & Ideas

Retailing Revolution: Category Killers on the Brink

others made diapers a highly competitive, money-losing proposition. Why underwrite the loss? Eliminating diapers from a grocery's offerings would make their baby sections unappealing to parents with young children—an attractive clientele.... View Details

Keywords: by Rajiv Lal & Jose B. Alvarez; Retail

19 Nov 2019
Op-Ed

Gender Bias Complaints against Apple Card Signal a Dark Side to Fintech

bias in Goldman Sachs’s underwriting model. (Goldman developed and issued the card.) Adding fuel to the fire, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak shared that the same thing had happened to him and his wife. Officials from the New York... View Details

Keywords: by Karen G. Mills; Financial Services

19 May 2003
Research & Ideas

Expensing Options Won’t Hurt High Tech

companies' market prices. More seriously, however, the claim simply ignores the fact that a lack of cash need not be a barrier to compensating executives. Rather than issuing options directly to employees, companies can always issue them to View Details

Keywords: by Zvi Bodie, Robert S. Kaplan & Robert C. Merton

04 Aug 2014
Op-Ed

Why Small-Business Lending Is Not Recovering

hurting small-business lending. Banks have been raising their capital reserves to comply with new standards initiated by risk-averse bank examiners and other regulators post-crisis. They are also hoarding deposits, which undermines their ability to View Details

Keywords: by Karen Mills; Banking; Financial Services

15 Jan 2018
Research & Ideas

A Better Business Model for Fighting Cancer

“Maybe you don’t get the perfect answer,” he says, “but for $50,000 you get three-quarters of the way to an answer that otherwise would have cost $500,000.” Or perhaps philanthropists who underwrite a drug’s development could receive... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Health; Pharmaceutical

14 Mar 2007
Op-Ed

Government’s Misguided Probe of Private Equity

jointly underwriting public corporate offerings. Nor is this unique to the United States. Britain's Financial Services Authority has announced that it is increasing its scrutiny of private-equity firms. Among the problems or risks... View Details

Keywords: by Josh Lerner; Financial Services

04 Mar 2009
Op-Ed

Credit is Not the Bogey

afford the payments—indeed, to buyers who have no "rainy day" savings. Underwriting must once again deserve the name. Micro-print contracts must be transparent and protect the consumer. Lenders must take responsibility not just... View Details

Keywords: by Nicolas P. Retsinas & Eric S. Belsky; Construction; Real Estate; Financial Services

24 Jul 2018
Op-Ed

4 Ways Managers Can Exercise Their 'Agency' to Change the World

General Motors was moving toward its vision of zero emissions and zero accidents by investing in electrified, shared, and autonomous vehicles. And while Wells Fargo was creating fraudulent accounts, Bank of America Merrill Lynch became a leader in View Details

Keywords: by George Serafeim

15 Nov 2006
Research & Ideas

Lessons Not Learned About Innovation

must contribute to the other. Q: What is the innovation pyramid and how does it work? A: The innovation pyramid is an innovation strategy that works at three levels. The lion's share of the investment underwrites a few big bets at the... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

17 Jun 2016
Op-Ed

Companies Need to Start Marketing Security to Customers

children. Volvo's latest goal is that no one should die in a Volvo car after 2020. Most firms just quietly test their products and services, receiving the blessing of Underwriters Laboratories, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, or... View Details

Keywords: by John A. Quelch; Entertainment & Recreation

20 Sep 2011
First Look

First Look: September 20

than commonly believed. Using a battery of performance tests, we find that loans securitized before 2005 performed no worse than comparable unsecuritized loans originated by the same bank. Even loans originated by the bank that acts as the CLO View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

24 Jul 2018
First Look

New Research and Ideas, July 24, 2018

on Snap: two with buy recommendations, six with holds, and six with sells. When the “IPO quiet period” expired three weeks later, 16 more analysts—who worked at firms that were underwriters for the IPO—issued recommendations: 10 with buy... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

03 Apr 2019
Book

Fintech's Game-Changing Opportunities for Small Business

cash flow transparency lends to the underwriting and risk assessment process. The basic technology to create a connected dashboard exists today. Why, if it is what small businesses want, has it not been developed? Today, each data stream... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Banking; Financial Services

12 Aug 2002
Research & Ideas

‘Let the Buyer Beware’ Doesn’t Protect Investors

some PowerPoint slides—a process that Bill Burnham, a former CSFB Internet analyst, calls 'the competitive devaluation of underwriting standards.' But nowhere did the wall between research and banking fall so completely as in Quattrone's... View Details

Keywords: by D. Quinn Mills

21 Jun 2011
First Look

First Look: June 21

eight basis point increase in yields. Additional analysis suggests that at least some of this effect is not driven by the risk of the bonds, but instead reflects inefficiency in the underwriting process. Download the paper:... View Details