Publications

January 2008 (Revised May 2008)
Case

Subprime Meltdown: American Housing and Global Financial Turmoil

By: Julio Rotemberg

This case focuses on the financial difficulties faced in the U.S. from August to December 2006 as well as their roots in subprime lending. After briefly discussing how mortgages were structured and traded in the pre-1990 period, it describes subprime mortgage lending,... View Details

Keywords: Financial Crisis; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Central Banking; Financial Markets; Mortgages; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; United States

December 2007 (Revised September 2009)
Case

Wall Street's First Panic (A)

By: David A. Moss and Cole Bolton

In the early 1790s, a flood of newly issued public and private securities sparked an investment boom in the nascent United States. In New York, the bustling commercial district along Wall Street emerged as the center of the city's securities trade. One of the many... View Details

Keywords: History; Financial Instruments; Auctions; Financial Crisis; Business and Government Relations; Financial Services Industry

08 Sep 2010
First Look

First Look: September 8, 2010

determinant of choices than fairness, and iii) agents display a marked propensity to work for principals with similar distributional concerns. Working PapersReport on the State of Available Data for the... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

November 2020
Supplement

Valuing Celgene's CVR

By: Benjamin C. Esty and Daniel Fisher

When Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS) acquired Celgene Corporation in November 2019, Celgene shareholders received cash, BMS stock, and a contingent value right (CVRs) that would pay $9 if the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved three of Celgene’s late stage... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Value; Valuation; Judgments; Decision Making; Cash Flow; Financial Instruments; Cognition and Thinking; Pharmaceutical Industry; Biotechnology Industry; United States

October 2007
Background Note

Price Formation

By: Joshua D. Coval and Erik Stafford

Investigates how prices are formed in competitive capital markets. Focuses on a single security called AOE. Students compete with computer traders and each other for market making and informed trading profits. Participants receive a variety of public news in the form... View Details

Keywords: Capital Markets; Price; Profit; Corporate Disclosure; Newsletters; Industry Structures; Business Processes; Competitive Strategy

Forthcoming
Book

Blockchain Forensics and Crypto-Related Cybercrimes

By: Lin William Cong, Kim Grauer, Daniel Rabetti and Henry Updegrave

This handbook provides an overview of various criminal activities related to cryptocurrencies, including investment scams, Ponzi schemes, rug pulls, ransomware attacks, money laundering, and darknet markets. We discuss the need for user protection and education,... View Details

Keywords: Cyberattacks; Blockchain; Network; Cryptocurrency; Crime and Corruption; Cybersecurity; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Law Enforcement; Technology Adoption

SSRN

May–June 2015
Article

Dead Weight: How Greece Wound up Trapped in the European Union

By: Debora L. Spar

In the early 1990s, Greece fell far afield of the economic criteria laid out by the Maastricht Treaty, the EU's founding document. In 1999, when the European monetary union was launched, Greece failed to meet the criteria again, but managed to squeeze into the body two... View Details

Keywords: EU; Geopolitics; Economic Conditions; Economy; Financial Crisis; Greece; European Union

Find at Harvard

07 Mar 2023
HBS Case

ChatGPT: Did Big Tech Set Up the World for an AI Bias Disaster?

ChatGPT’s buzzy debut has made for a rough few months for Google. Close watchers of the tech giant say: It didn’t have to go this way. Essentially scooped by a competitor on its home turf, Google has scrambled to release its own... View Details

Keywords: by Scott Van Voorhis; Technology

March 2006 (Revised April 2010)
Case

China: To Float or Not To Float? (A)

By: Laura Alfaro, Rafael M. Di Tella and Ingrid Vogel

On July 21, 2005 China revalued its decade-long quasi-fixed exchange rate of approximately 8.28 yuan per U.S. dollar by 2.1% to 8.11 and, at the same time, introduced a more market-based exchange rate system. Many analysts and economists were disappointed with what... View Details

Keywords: Macroeconomics; Trade; Currency Exchange Rate; Governance Controls; Policy; Growth and Development Strategy; China

January 2011
Case

Sidoti & Company: Launching a Micro-Cap Product

By: Boris Groysberg, Paul M. Healy and Sarah Abbott

It is 2010 and Sidoti & Company, a New York-based brokerage firm specializing in small capitalization stocks, has just launched a new product- micro cap stock research. The firm has hired a group of five analysts who will produce written research reports on micro-cap... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Financial Strategy; Product Launch; Strategic Planning; Corporate Strategy; Financial Services Industry; New York (city, NY)

Find at Harvard

17 Jan 2024
Research & Ideas

Are Companies Getting Away with 'Cheap Talk' on Climate Goals?

Companies regularly set ambitious climate goals, but these plans often end up like many people’s New Year’s resolutions: unmet aspirations that quietly fizzle out. While companies often gain positive media attention by trumpeting plans for reducing greenhouse gas... View Details

Keywords: by Tim Gray

Research Summary

Global Supply Chains: The Looming “Great Reallocation”

By: Laura Alfaro

Global supply chains have come under unprecedented stress as a result of US-China trade tensions, the Covid-19 pandemic, and geopolitical shocks. We document shifts in the pattern of US participation in global value chains over the last four decades, in terms of... View Details

22 Aug 2005
Research & Ideas

Restoring a Global Economy, 1950–1980

balance of trade in the 1960s, and the devaluation of the U.S. dollar and the end of its convertibility into gold in 1971, provided symbolic... View Details

Keywords: by Geoffrey Jones

26 Mar 2019
First Look

New Research and Ideas, March 26, 2019

https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=53888 Trade Secrets Protection and Antitakeover Provisions By: Dey, Aiyesha, and Joshua White Abstract—We examine whether and why managers strengthen antitakeover provisions when facing an... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

September 2009
Case

Culinarian Cookware: Pondering Price Promotion

By: John A. Quelch and Heather Beckham

In November of 2006, senior executives at Culinarian Cookware were debating the merits of price promotions for the company's premium cookware products. The VP of Marketing, Donald Janus, and Senior Sales Manager, Victoria Brown, had different views. Janus felt price... View Details

Keywords: Profitability Analysis; Consumer Marketing; Brand Equity; Pricing Policies; Sales Promotions; Small ＆ Medium-sized Enterprises; Decisions; Goals and Objectives; Price; Marketing Strategy; Consumer Behavior; Management Teams; Sales; Brands and Branding; Consumer Products Industry

07 Jul 2008
Research & Ideas

Innovation Corrupted: How Managers Can Avoid Another Enron

officer Ken Lay made him president of Enron's new trading operations. In 2001, Skilling was named CEO. Before 1997, Enron was an innovative and profitable player in the newly deregulated natural gas... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Energy; Utilities

September 2012 (Revised May 2013)
Case

Automating the Paris Subway (A)

By: Michel Anteby, Elena Corsi and Emilie Billaud

In 2001, the head of the Paris Subway reflected on how to transform Line 1 into a driverless line without triggering a social conflict. After the shock of the 2000 Notre Dame de Lorette subway accident, in which a train derailed and caused 25 injuries in a Paris subway... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Technological Innovation; Rail Transportation; Labor Unions; Job Cuts and Outsourcing; Conflict Management; Rail Industry; Transportation Industry; Paris

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