...International Finance: A Course Overview Mihir A. Desai* Harvard University and NBER ABSTRACT This paper describes the International Finance course at Harvard Business School for instructors considering adopting the associated material. The paper begins by arguing that the forces of globalization have fundamentally changed the scope and activities of firms thereby altering the practice of finance within these firms. As a consequence of an increasing reliance on tightly-integrated foreign operations, a parallel world of finance has been opened within every multinational firm and this world has, heretofore, been overlooked. The course materials are designed to address the many aspects of financial decision making within global firms prompted by these changes that are not addressed in traditional materials. The paper provides an overview of the structure of the course and its seven modules with particular emphasis on the three modules that constitute the core of the course. The paper also describes an analytical framework that has been developed through the creation of the course materials to guide critical financial decisions on financing, investment, risk management and incentive management within a multinational firm. This framework emphasizes the need to reconcile conflicting forces in order for multinational firms to gain competitive advantage from their internal capital markets. The paper concludes with a discussion of the course's pedagogical approach and detailed descriptions of...
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...Industrial, do Trabalho e da Empresa, Faculdade de Economia, Universidade do Porto, Portugal. Correspondence to: Jorge Farinha, Faculdade de Economia da Universidade do Porto, Rua Roberto Frias, 4200 Porto, Portugal. Tel. (351)-22-5571100, Fax (351)-22-5505050. E-mail: jfarinha@fep.up.pt. CORPORATE GOVERNANCE: A SURVEY OF THE LITERATURE ABSTRACT This paper reviews the theoretical and empirical literature on the nature and consequences of the corporate governance problem, providing some guidance on the major points of consensus and dissent among researchers on this issue. Also analysed is the effectiveness of a set of external and internal disciplining mechanisms in providing a solution for the corporate governance problem. Apart from this, particular emphases are given to the special conflicts arising from the relationship between managers and shareholders in companies with large ownership diffusion, the issue of managerial entrenchment and the link between firm value and corporate governance. Keywords: agency theory, corporate governance, ownership structure JEL Classification: G300 1 1 Introduction Recent financial scandals associated to accounting and other frauds allegedly blamed to top company managers (e.g. Enron, Worldcom, Adelphia) have brought into public light the recurring question of whether companies are managed on the best interests of shareholders and other company stakeholders such as workers, creditors and the general community. A point that has been...
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...10.1561/0500000018 Empirical Capital Structure: A Review Christopher Parsons1 and Sheridan Titman2 1 2 University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA, Chris Parsons@kenan-flagler.unc.edu University of Texas at Austin, USA, Sheridan.Titman@mccombs.utexas.edu Abstract This survey provides a synthesis of the empirical capital structure literature. Our synthesis is divided into three parts. The first part examines the evidence that relates to the cross-sectional determinants of capital structure. This literature identifies and discusses the characteristics of firms that tend to be associated with different debt ratios. In the second part, we review the literature that examines changes in capital structure. The papers in this literature explore factors that move firms away from their target capital structures as well as the extent to which future financing choices move firms back toward their targets. Finally, we complete our review with a set of studies that explore the consequences of leverage, rather than its determinants. These studies are concerned with feedback from financing to real decisions. For example, we explore how a firm’s financing choices influences its incentive to invest in its workers, price its products, form relationships with suppliers, or compete aggressively with competitors. 1 Introduction Corporations fund their operations by raising capital from a variety of distinct sources. The mix between the various sources, generally referred to as the firm’s...
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... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Peter Temin Elisha Gray II Professor of Economics Chairperson, Department Committee on Graduate Studies Essays in Banking and Risk Management by James Ian Vickery Submitted to the Department of Economics on August 15 2004, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Economics Abstract This thesis consists of three essays at the intersection of banking, corporate finance and macroeconomics. Unifying the essays are two themes: firstly a focus on how firms (Chapter 1 and Chapter 2) and individuals (Chapter 3) insure against, and react to, sources of macroeconomic risk; secondly the role of financial institutions in the transmission of macroeconomic shocks. Turning to specifics, Chapter 1 is a...
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...The WACC Fallacy: The Real Effects of Using a Unique Discount Rate 1 Philipp Kr¨ ger u Geneva Finance Research Institute - Universit´ de Gen`ve e e Augustin Landier Toulouse School of Economics David Thesmar HEC Paris and CEPR First Version: February 2011 This Version: September 2011 We greatly appreciate comments and suggestions by Malcolm Baker, Andor Gy¨rgy, Owen Lamont, o Masahiro Watanabe, Jeff Wurgler and seminar participants at the NBER Behavioral Finance Spring Meeting, the University of Mannheim, the 2011 European Financial Management Association meetings, the 2011 European Finance Association meetings, the CEPR European Summer Symposium on Financial Markets and HEC Lausanne. Boris Vall´e provided excellent research assistance. Thesmar e thanks the HEC Foundation for financial support. Corresponding Author: Philipp Kr¨ger. Email: u philipp.krueger@unige.ch, Telephone: +41 (0)22 379 85 69. Augustin Landier, augustin.landier@tsefr.eu, Telephone: +33 (0)5 61 12 86 88. David Thesmar, thesmar@hec.fr, Telephone: +33 (0)1 39 67 94 12. 1 Electronic copy available at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1764024 The WACC Fallacy: The Real Effects of Using a Unique Discount Rate Abstract We document investment distortions induced by the use of a single discount rate within firms. According to textbook capital budgeting, firms should value any project using a discount rate determined by the risk characteristics of the project. If they use a unique company-wide discount...
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...Journal of Banking & Finance 27 (2003) 1297–1321 www.elsevier.com/locate/econbase Corporate governance, dividend payout policy, and the interrelation between dividends, R&D, and capital investment Klaus Gugler * Department of Economics, University of Vienna, WP No. 9803, Br€nnerstrasse 72, 1210 Vienna, Austria u Received 12 October 2000; accepted 5 November 2001 Abstract This paper investigates the relationship between dividends and the ownership and control structure of the firm. For a panel of Austrian firms over the 1991/99 period, we find that statecontrolled firms engage in dividend smoothing, while family-controlled firms do not. The latter choose significantly lower target payout levels. Consistently, state-controlled firms are most reluctant and family-controlled firms are least reluctant to cut dividends when cuts are warranted. The dividend behavior of bank- and foreign-controlled firms lies in between stateand family-controlled firms. This is consistent with the expected ‘‘ranking’’ of information asymmetries and managerial agency costs. The above results hold for firms with good investment opportunities. We find that firms with low growth opportunities optimally disgorge cash irrespective of who controls the firm. Ó 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. JEL classification: G3; L2; D9 Keywords: Corporate governance; Dividend policy; Simultaneous equations 1. Introduction In March 1999, Richard Schenz, the CEO of OMV AG, the largest Austrian corporation, announced...
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...NBER WORKING PAPER SERIES BANK SUPERVISION AND CORPORATE FINANCE Thorsten Beck Asli Demirgüç-Kunt Ross Levine Working Paper 9620 http://www.nber.org/papers/w9620 NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138 April 2003 This paper’s findings, interpretations, and conclusions are entirely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the World Bank, its Executive Directors, or the countries they represent. We thank J. Boyd, G. Caprio, C. Schenone, seminar participants at the University of Minnesota and the Banco Central de Chile for helpful suggestions. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the National Bureau of Economic Research. ©2003 by Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt, and Ross Levine. All rights reserved. Short sections of text not to exceed two paragraphs, may be quoted without explicit permission provided that full credit including ©notice, is given to the source. Bank Supervision and Corporate Finance Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt, and Ross Levine NBER Working Paper No. 9620 April 2003 JEL No. G3, L51, O16, G21 ABSTRACT We examine the impact of bank supervision on the financing obstacles faced by almost 5,000 corporations across 49 countries. We find that firms in countries with strong official supervisory agencies that directly monitor banks tend to face greater financing obstacles. Moreover, powerful official supervision tends to...
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...often repurchase subsidiaries at large discounts to valuations at the time of listing and experience positive abnormal returns when repurchases are announced. * We thank Malcolm Baker, Mihir Desai, Masako Egawa, Alp Ercil, Yasushi Hamao, Sam Hanson, Naoki Kamiyama, David Matsa, David Scharfstein, Andrei Shleifer, Jeremy Stein, Kenji Wada, Lucy White, and seminar participants at Georgetown, Harvard, IESE, the NBER Japan program, the NBER Law and Economics Program, and Washington University in St. Louis for helpful comments. We also thank Jim Quinn, John Ng, and Sonya Lai for research assistance and Masako Egawa, Alp Ercil, Lydia Petersen, Naoki Kamiyama, Daiwa Institute of Research Ltd., Toyo Keizai Inc., and the Sandra Ann Moreilli Pacific-Basin Capital Markets Research Center for help assembling...
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...Xueping Wu† , Piet Sercu‡ and Charles Chen§ First draft: November 1998; this version: October 2000 ∗ Jun Yao and Shu-Chuen Chong provided helpful research assistance. The authors thank Kathryn Dewenter, Amar Gande, Larry Goldberg, Ser-Huang Poon, Kazunori Suzuki, and other participants at the 1999 WFA and 2000 EFA Conferences and workshops at HKUST, K.U.Leuven, and Strathclyde; and Yasushi Hamao, Nancy Huyghebaert, Shuhe Li, Xijia Su, Linda Van de Gucht, and Cynthia Van Hulle for useful discussions or comments that have substantially improved content as well as presentation. All remaining errors are the authors’. † City University of Hong Kong, Department of Economics and Finance, Tat Chee Avenue, Kowloon, Hong Kong. Tel: (852) 2788 7577; Fax: (852) 2788 8806; email: efxpwu@cityu.edu.hk. ‡ (Corresponding author) KU Leuven, Graduate School of Business Studies, Naamsestraat 69, B3000 Leuven; Tel: +32 16 32 6756; Fax: +32 16 32 6620; email: piet.sercu@econ.kuleuven.ac.be. § Department of Accountancy, City University of Hong Kong; Tel: (852) 2788 7909; Fax: (852) 2788 7002; email: accpj@cityu.edu.hk. Abstract We test how keiretsu membership affects the Fama and French (1999) required IRR on value (or cost of capital) and the IRR on cost (or return on investment), 1974-95, of all listed non-financials in Japan. Rather than computing point estimates from aggregate data, we employ non-linear cross-sectional regression analysis of individual-firm data and...
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...Petersen, Mitchell A. Working Paper Does the source of capital affect capital structure? CSIO working paper, No. 0054 Provided in Cooperation with: Department of Economics - Center for the Study of Industrial Organization (CSIO), Northwestern University Suggested Citation: Faulkender, Michael; Petersen, Mitchell A. (2004) : Does the source of capital affect capital structure?, CSIO working paper, No. 0054 This Version is available at: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/38692 Nutzungsbedingungen: Die ZBW räumt Ihnen als Nutzerin/Nutzer das unentgeltliche, räumlich unbeschränkte und zeitlich auf die Dauer des Schutzrechts beschränkte einfache Recht ein, das ausgewählte Werk im Rahmen der unter → http://www.econstor.eu/dspace/Nutzungsbedingungen nachzulesenden vollständigen Nutzungsbedingungen zu vervielfältigen, mit denen die Nutzerin/der Nutzer sich durch die erste Nutzung einverstanden erklärt. zbw Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft Leibniz Information Centre for Economics Terms of use: The ZBW grants you, the user, the non-exclusive right to use the selected work free of charge, territorially unrestricted and within the time limit of the term of the property rights according to the terms specified at → http://www.econstor.eu/dspace/Nutzungsbedingungen By the first use of the selected work the user agrees and declares to comply with these terms of use. THE CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION AT NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY Working Paper #0054 Does the Source of Capital...
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...Pagano, Fabio Panetta, Luigi Zingales Source: The Journal of Finance, Vol. 53, No. 1 (Feb., 1998), pp. 27-64 Published by: Blackwell Publishing for the American Finance Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/117434 . Accessed: 24/08/2011 01:33 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org. Blackwell Publishing and American Finance Association are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Journal of Finance. http://www.jstor.org THE JOURNAL OF FINANCE * VOL LIII, NO. 1 * FEBRUARY 1998 Why Do Companies Go Public? An Empirical Analysis MARCO PAGANO, FABIO PANETTA, and LUIGI ZINGALES* ABSTRACT Using a large database of private firms in Italy, we analyze the determinants of initial public offerings (IPOs) by comparingthe ex ante and ex post characteristics of IPOs with those of private firms. The likelihood of an IPO is increasing in the company's size and the industry's market-to-bookratio. Companies appear to go public not to finance future investments and growth, but to rebalance...
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...Essays in Banking and Risk Management by James Ian Vickery B.Ec.(Hons), University of New South Wales (1997) Submitted to the Department of Economics in partial fulllment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Economics at the MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY September 2004 c ° James Ian Vickery, MMIV. All rights reserved. The author hereby grants to Massachusetts Institute of Technology permission to reproduce and to distribute copies of this thesis document in whole or in part. Signature of Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Department of Economics August 15 2004 Certied by . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Ricardo Caballero Ford International Professor of Economics Thesis Supervisor Accepted by. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Peter Temin Elisha Gray II Professor of Economics Chairperson, Department Committee on Graduate Studies Essays in Banking and Risk Management by James Ian Vickery Submitted to the Department of Economics on August 15 2004, in partial fulllment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Economics Abstract This thesis consists of three essays at the intersection...
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...2009 Peng, Sun, Pinkham, and Chen A R T I 63 C L E The Institution-Based View as a Third Leg for a Strategy Tripod by Mike W. Peng, Sunny Li Sun, Brian Pinkham, and Hao Chen Executive Overview This article identifies the emergence of the institution-based view as a third leading perspective in strategic management (the first two being the industry-based and resource-based views). We (a) review the roots of the institution-based view, (b) articulate its two core propositions, and (c) outline how this view contributes to the four fundamental questions in strategy. Overall, we suggest that the institution-based view represents the third leg of a strategy tripod, overcomes the long-standing criticisms of the industrybased and resource-based views’ lack of attention to contexts, and contributes significant new insights as part of the broader intellectual movement centered on new institutionalism. A s part of a broader intellectual movement centered on new institutionalism throughout the social sciences in recent decades (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983, 1991; North, 1990, 2005; Scott, 1987, 1995, 2008b; Williamson, 1975, 1985), strategic management researchers have increasingly realized that institutions are more than background conditions (Oliver, 1997; Peng & Heath, 1996). Instead, “institutions directly determine what arrows a firm has in its quiver as it struggles to formulate and implement strategy” (Ingram & Silverman, 2002, p. 20...
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...ARTICLE IN PRESS Journal of Financial Economics 94 (2009) 150–169 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Financial Economics journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jfec Stock market liquidity and firm value$ Vivian W. Fang a, Thomas H. Noe b,c, Sheri Tice c,Ã a Rutgers Business School, Rutgers University, Newark, NJ 07102, USA Said Business School and Balliol College, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 1HP, UK c A.B. Freeman School of Business, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118, USA b a r t i c l e i n f o abstract Article history: Received 25 April 2008 Received in revised form 19 August 2008 Accepted 28 August 2008 Available online 21 June 2009 This paper investigates the relation between stock liquidity and firm performance. The study shows that firms with liquid stocks have better performance as measured by the firm market-to-book ratio. This result is robust to the inclusion of industry or firm fixed effects, a control for idiosyncratic risk, a control for endogenous liquidity using two-stage least squares, and the use of alternative measures of liquidity. To identify the causal effect of liquidity on firm performance, we study an exogenous shock to liquidity—the decimalization of stock trading—and show that the increase in liquidity around decimalization improves firm performance. The causes of liquidity’s beneficial effect are investigated: Liquidity increases the information content of market prices and of performance-sensitive...
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...Mergers, Acquisitions and Corporate Restructuring II MERGERS, ACQUISITIONS AND CORPORATE RESTRUCTURING Mergers, Acquisitions and Corporate Restructuring Edited by Chandrashekar Krishnamurti Vishwanath S.R. Copyright © Chandrashekar Krishnamurti and Vishwanath S.R., 2008 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. First published in 2008 by Response Books Business Books from SAGE B1/I-1 Mohan Cooperative Industrial Area Mathura Road, New Delhi 110 044, India SAGE Publications Inc 2455 Teller Road Thousand Oaks, California 91320, USA SAGE Publications Ltd 1 Oliver’s Yard, 55 City Road London EC1Y 1SP, United Kingdom SAGE Publications Asia-Pacific Pte Ltd 33 Pekin Street #02-01 Far East Square Singapore 048763 Published by Vivek Mehra for Response Books, typeset in 9.5/13 pt Berthold Baskerville by Star Compugraphics Private Limited, Delhi and printed at Chaman Enterprises, New Delhi. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Mergers, acquisitions and corporate restructuring/edited by Chandrashekar Krishnamurti, Vishwanath S.R. p. cm. Includes references and index. 1. Consolidation and merger of corporations. Corporate reorganizations. I. Vishwanath, S.R., 1971– II. Krishnamurti, Chandrashekar, 1956– HG4028.M4 .M44 658.1/6 22 2008...
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