Publications

Educators

February 2016
Article

Do Measures of Financial Constraints Measure Financial Constraints?

By: Joan Farre-Mensa and Alexander Ljungqvist

Financial constraints are fundamental to empirical 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... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Finance

SSRN

Teaching Interest

Demystifying the Family Enterprise

By: Christina R. Wing

This course is primarily designed for students who are pursuing a career in family run businesses, family owned businesses, investment roles in family offices, or students that might invest in or wholly purchase a family owned business through a private equity firm,... View Details

February 2005
Article

Can Foreign Firms Bond Themselves Effectively by Renting U.S. Securities Laws?

By: Jordan I. Siegel

The study tests the functional convergence hypothesis, which states that foreign firms can leapfrog their countries' weak legal institutions by listing equities in New York and agreeing to follow U.S. securities law. Evidence shows that the SEC and minority... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Governance; Cross-listing; Reputation; Bonding; Business Ventures; Laws and Statutes; Financial Instruments; United States; Mexico

Read Now

Article

Coming to America: IPOs from Emerging Market Issuers

By: Robert Bruner, Susan Chaplinsky and Latha Ramchand

We compare the issue costs of 299 companies from emerging and developed market countries making initial public offerings (IPOs) in the United States between 1991 and 2001. Our results indicate that IPOs from emerging markets experience the same costs on average as IPOs... View Details

Read Now

April 1996 (Revised January 2006)
Case

Times Mirror Company PEPS Proposal Review

By: Peter Tufano

Times Mirror Co. (TMC) owns a substantial block of Netscape common stock purchased prior to Netscape's IPO, on which it has substantial unrealized gains. TMC is restricted from selling the stock in a public offering and is therefore considering a proposal by Morgan... View Details

Keywords: Risk Management; Stocks; Taxation; Corporate Finance; Telecommunications Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry; United States

Educators

06 Nov 2007
First Look

First Look: November 6, 2007

some implications for the future growth of the industry. Purchase this note: http://www.hbsp.harvard.edu/b01/en/common/item_detail.jhtml?id=804176 Blue River Capital Harvard Business School Case 708-448 Examines the strategy and experience of Indian private View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

November 2006 (Revised October 2007)
Case

Artisan Entertainment Inc.

Geoff Rehnert and Marc Wolpow have left Bain Capital to launch Audax Group. As part of their separation, they have been granted 90-day options to purchase Bain Capital's stake in a number of portfolio companies at Fair Market Value. As they conside whether to exercise... View Details

Keywords: Leveraged Buyouts; Private Equity; Financing and Loans; Investment Funds

May 2013
Teaching Plan

High Wire Act: Credit Suisse and Contingent Capital

By: Clayton Rose and David Lane

Late in 2010, Credit Suisse CEO Brady Dougan and his team considered whether or not to issue contingent capital, which Swiss regulators would require by 2019. They faced a number of substantial issues, including: Would contingent capital actually work as conceptualized... View Details

Keywords: Financial Institutions; Capital Markets; Financial Crisis; Decision Choices and Conditions; Leadership; International Finance; Financial Liquidity; Risk and Uncertainty; Competitive Strategy; Financial Services Industry; Switzerland

Research Summary

Do Measures of Financial Constraints Measure Financial Constraints?

Financial constraints are fundamental to empirical research in finance and economics. In joint work with Alexander Ljunqvist, we propose two novel tests to evaluate how well measures of financial constraints actually capture constraints. We find that firms... View Details

15 Jun 2010
First Look

First Look: June 15

and tight monetary policy. To illustrate our point, in the last half of 2007, 36% of all debt issues were bank loans. However, relative loan issuance fell to 8% by the first half of 2009, the lowest level in the period from 1990 to 2009.... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

01 Feb 2017
News

The Morning Risk Report: Corporate Cash Distribution Isn’t Short-Termism Culprit

23 Oct 2012
First Look

First Look: October 23

Trichakis Publication:Management Science (forthcoming) Abstract This paper deals with a basic issue: How does one approach the problem of designing the "right" objective for a given resource allocation problem? The notion of what is right can be fairly... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

February 2017 (Revised January 2018)
Case

Womenomics in Japan

By: Boris Groysberg, Mayuka Yamazaki, Nobuo Sato and David Lane

This case profiles Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's vigorous attempts to revive Japan's economy, specifically by advocating for a larger role for women in the economy—not as a matter of social policy or gender equity per se, but as an essential element of any solution to... View Details

Keywords: Gender Equality; Japan; Leadership; Government-business Relations; Shinzo Abe; Economic Growth; Aging Society; Womenomics; Abenomics; Labor Market Discrimination; Workplace Culture; Women And Leadership; Change Management; Leading Change; Gender; Business and Government Relations; Growth and Development; Employment; Working Conditions

Educators

March 2009 (Revised April 2011)
Course Overview Note

Growing, Financing, and Managing Family and Closely Held Firms: Overview of the Course

By: Belen Villalonga

Most companies around the world are controlled by their founding families, including more than half of all public corporations in the U.S. and Europe and more than two thirds of those in Asia. These companies are the subject of the Financial Management of Family and... View Details

Keywords: Family Business; Financial Management; Corporate Governance; Governing and Advisory Boards; Family Ownership; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Valuation

Web

Harvard Business School Announces Latest RISE Fellows - MBA

Blog Blog MBA Voices Filter Results Arrow Down Arrow Up Read posts from Author Alumni Author Career and Professional Development Staff Author HBS Community Author HBS Faculty Author MBA Admissions Author MBA Students Topics Topics 1st Year (RC) 2+2 Program 2nd Year... View Details

March 2010
Article

The Evolution of Corporate Ownership after IPO: The Impact of Investor Protection

By: C. Fritz Foley and Robin Greenwood

We use firm-level data from 34 countries covering the 1995-2006 period to analyze how the characteristics of public markets shape the process by which firms become widely held. Firms in all countries in the sample tend to have concentrated ownership at the time they go... View Details

Keywords: Blockholding; Float; Shareholder Rights; Investor Protection; Ownership; Financial Liquidity; Business History; Market Timing; Going Public; Business and Government Relations; Business and Shareholder Relations

19 Mar 2006
Research & Ideas

Unlocking Your Investment Capital

Many companies can double or even triple their capacity to invest in strategic assets and competencies by properly managing their "risk balance sheet," argues Harvard Business School professor Robert C. Merton. In a provocative article on the subject in the... View Details

Keywords: by Ann Cullen; Financial Services

11 Mar 2008
First Look

First Look: March 11, 2008

simulated agents and human bidders that mechanism designers should take into account before placing too much faith in simulations to test the performance of mechanisms intended for human use. Go-Shop Provisions in Private Equity Deals:... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

2024
Working Paper

Fire Sales of Safe Assets

By: Gabor Pinter, Emil Siriwardane and Danny Walker

We use trade-level data to study price pressure effects in the UK gilt market from September to October 2022. During this period, forced sales by liability-driven investment funds (LDIs) led to price discounts on the order of 10%, accounting for roughly half the total... View Details

Keywords: Investment Funds; Capital Markets; United Kingdom