Publications

Person Page

Press / Media

By: Debora L. Spar

I'll have a girl, please

American Public Media [Marketplace], 12 September 2006

DR. DEBORAH SPAR: "The ability to choose gender is really only the first... View Details

January 1994
Case

National Convenience Stores, Inc.

By: Steven R. Fenster, Stuart C. Gilson and Roy Burstin

National Convenience Stores seeks to emerge from Chapter 11. Central to the nature of the reorganization plan is the company's determining enterprise value. The various constituencies (secured debt, unsecured debt, etc.) will seek to find an enterprise value that... View Details

Keywords: Capital Structure; Valuation; Restructuring; Strategic Planning; Borrowing and Debt; Food and Beverage Industry; Texas

February 1997 (Revised December 2012)
Case

Jim Sharpe: Extrusion Technology, Inc. (A)

By: H. Kent Bowen and Barbara Feinberg

Jim Sharpe, 11 years after receiving his MBA from Harvard and working for others, has finally become his own boss and 100% owner of manufacturer of aluminum extrusions. After 10 months of an unfunded search, he acquires the business in an LBO and prepares to face his... View Details

Keywords: Acquisitions; Search Funds; Entrepreneurial Management; Entrepreneurs; Turnarounds; Bank Loan; Manufacturing; Metals Processing; Entrepreneurial Finance; Leveraged Buyouts; Labor Unions; Entrepreneurship; Financing and Loans; Crisis Management; Management Skills; Experience and Expertise; Borrowing and Debt; Manufacturing Industry

December 2010
Case

Financing Higher Education in Australia

By: David A. Moss and Stephanie Lo

Even before Australian lawmakers abolished university tuition in 1973, students in Australia had long benefited from low tuition and large government subsidies. By the early 1980s, however, the nation's universities faced growing budget challenges and an apparent... View Details

Keywords: Economic Slowdown and Stagnation; Higher Education; Borrowing and Debt; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; Education Industry; Australia

March 2007 (Revised May 2012)
Case

PRG-Schultz International

By: Paul W. Marshall and James Weber

PRG-Schultz will run out of cash within a couple of months unless the new CEO can reduce costs and restructure the company's debt. PRG was the dominant market leader in the audit recovery industry. The industry consisted of firms which employed accounting professionals... View Details

Keywords: History; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Leadership; Restructuring; Cost Management; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Borrowing and Debt; Accounting Audits; Accounting Industry

02 Jun 2011
What Do You Think?

Is it Time for a National Bankruptcy?

example, debt seems to be on the mind of a lot of people. That's ironic at a time when, as one CEO recently told me, "There is a sale on money." (One company with which I am familiar acted on that belief recently by View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

July 2000 (Revised November 2001)
Case

Catalyst Medical Solutions

By: Amy C. Edmondson, Richard M.J. Bohmer and Naomi Atkins

Faced with a drop in the NASDAQ, four eHealth entrepreneurs must decide between two distribution strategies for their new company's technology. The team, comprised of three full-time resident physicians and an MBA, has developed software to enable electronic... View Details

Keywords: Product Development; Health Care and Treatment; Distribution; Strategy; Venture Capital; Applications and Software; Partners and Partnerships; Borrowing and Debt; Information Technology Industry; Service Industry

Keywords: Byron Wien; Performing Arts, Spectator Sports, and Related Industries; Performing Arts, Spectator Sports, and Related Industries; Performing Arts, Spectator Sports, and Related Industries; Performing Arts, Spectator Sports, and Related Industries; Performing Arts, Spectator Sports, and Related Industries; Performing Arts, Spectator Sports, and Related Industries; Performing Arts, Spectator Sports, and Related Industries; Performing Arts, Spectator Sports, and Related Industries

Find at Harvard

01 Dec 2008
News

A U.S. Turnaround?

overburdened by debt is that it has steadily taken more borrowing to finance our growth. In the 1950s the economy grew by 73 cents for each dollar of added debt. In the 1960s it was 65 cents. By the 1980s it... View Details

11 Feb 2015
Research & Ideas

Politicians Benefited From Using Toxic Loans

their study on France, having gained access to two valuable data sets: The first contained the entire debt portfolio for most of the 300 largest French local governments as of December 31, 2007; and the... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Financial Services

May 2004 (Revised November 2005)
Case

Turkey: Securing Stability in a Rough Neighborhood

By: Richard H.K. Vietor and Emily Thompson

After suffering years of volatility and crises, Turkey desperately sought macroeconomic and political stability in an ever-worsening region of the world. In the short term, Turkey had to repay its debt, which amounted to more than 80% of GDP. By January 2004, Turkey... View Details

Keywords: Public Sector; Inflation and Deflation; Macroeconomics; Borrowing and Debt; Banks and Banking; International Finance; Privatization; Religion; Turkey; European Union

July 1997
Teaching Note

Jupiter Management Company, Teaching Note

By: W. Carl Kester

Teaching Note for (9-292-107). View Details

Keywords: Investment Funds; Borrowing and Debt; Financial Services Industry

March 1992 (Revised November 1992)
Case

Lockheed Aeromod Center, Inc.

By: Timothy A. Luehrman

A wholly-owned subsidiary of Lockheed Corp. has an $11 million expansion underway in South Carolina. The company must decide how best to take advantage of the opportunity to issue tax exempt debt. Specifically, the decision involves choices about the maturity and... View Details

Keywords: Business Subsidiaries; Decisions; Borrowing and Debt; Financial Strategy; Taxation; Opportunities; Expansion; Valuation; South Carolina

February 2011
Journal Article

Minimal Settlement Assets in Economies with Interconnected Financial Obligations

By: Julio J. Rotemberg

A model is developed where firms belonging to a group are obliged to make payments to one another by using a liquid asset. The paper studies the exogenous endowments of this asset that are necessary to assure that all obligations are met. Conditions are presented under... View Details

Keywords: Borrowing and Debt; Financial Liquidity; Financing and Loans; Networks

Find at Harvard

February 1991
Case

Burlington Northern: The ARES Decision (B)

By: Julie H. Hertenstein and Robert S. Kaplan

The ARES team formally proposes that Burlington Northern implement the ARES system. The project meets resistance. In light of financial restructuring and high level of debt, executives wonder whether the company can afford ARES. Weak links during the ARES development... View Details

Keywords: Accounting Audits; Restructuring; Cost vs Benefits; Decision Choices and Conditions; Borrowing and Debt; Capital Budgeting; Projects; Technology Adoption; Service Industry

04 Aug 2014
Op-Ed

Why Small-Business Lending Is Not Recovering

years during the crisis and subsequent recovery. In addition, collateral owned by small businesses lost value during the financial crisis, potentially making small business borrowers less creditworthy... View Details

Keywords: by Karen Mills; Banking; Financial Services

April 2011 (Revised January 2024)
Case

The Greek Crisis: Tragedy or Opportunity?

By: Dante Roscini, Jonathan Schlefer and Konstantinos Dimitriou

After its 2009-2010 fiscal crisis shook the euro, could the Greek government stabilize debt, avoid default, and stay on the euro? This case looks at the Greek social and political road to fiscal crisis; the economics of that crisis and efforts to recover from it; the... View Details

Keywords: Financial Crisis; Borrowing and Debt; Currency; Financial Condition; Central Banking; Financial Markets; International Finance; Policy; Conflict Management; Cooperation; Public Administration Industry; Greece

01 Sep 2015
First Look

First Look -- September 1, 2015

research in finance and economics. We propose two tests to evaluate how well measures of financial constraints actually capture constraints. We find that firms typically classified as constrained do not in fact behave as if they were... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

1994
Chapter

International Experiences with Securities Transaction Taxes

By: K. A. Froot and J. Campbell

Keywords: Corporation Taxation; Interest Deductibility; Cost Of Capital; Corporate Finance; Accounting; Borrowing and Debt; Financing and Loans; Interest Rates