Finance (FINC-GB)

This is an introductory course in corporate finance. The course has three main objectives: 1) Develop an understanding of the tools that are used to value investment projects and companies (valuation). 2) Understand the basic issues involved in how firms should raise funds for their real investments (financing). 3) Evaluate how investment and financing decisions are related. Emphasis will be placed on appreciating the limitations and challenges that are faced when applying the theoretical framework of corporate finance to real world problems.

The goal of the course is to develop an understanding of the interplay of sustainability and finance and related risks and opportunities. We will address the challenges associated with understanding, measuring, and pricing these new sources of risk and how to assess the related opportunities. This course will provide you with the tools to create a sustainable long-term business model and assess extra-financial risks impacting corporate and investment performance.

Businesses and governments now face a growing and immediate array of nonfinancial risks, including climate-related, cyber and operational, and geopolitical risks. Precisely because these critical risks are hard to measure and analyze, firms are putting new resources – people and money– to work to anticipate, manage and mitigate them. To address cybersecurity risks, for example, JP Morgan alone has 3000 employees and spends $600 million annually. Firms are only starting to grapple with existential climate-related risks. And startups are mushrooming to provide assessments to businesses. This course will study these risks alongside financial risks. It will outline frameworks for measuring, assessing and analyzing them, and for actions needed to meet them. We will examine case studies of climate, cyber and geopolitical risks, including from current events. Finally, we will study whether and how the information in financial markets can both inform the assessment of these risks and potentially provide tools to transfer, insure against or hedge them.

The six-session course focuses on understanding the causes, dynamics and consequences of notable currency crises that have occurred in Emerging Markets countries over the last three decades. These economies have been particularly susceptible to significant currency volatility over the years, especially as their capital markets have increasingly opened to global investors.

This course teaches how to make optimal investment and financing decisions. Specific topics include valuation techniques (net present value rule), a discussion of the many shortcomings of the popular internal rate of return rule, real options, extracting cash flows from accounting data, estimating a project's or firm's cost of capital, the choice between debt and equity, and the effect of financing decisions on investment decisions (using the popular ""WACC"" method).

What moves market prices for instruments like stocks? Is it fundamentals like earnings, growth, discount rates etc. or something else like psychology & frictions or a combination of both. Finance theory has long relied on a descriptively sparse model of behavior based on the premise that investors and managers are rational at a collective level and that arbitrage frictions are minimal. In recent years both assumptions have been questioned as the standard model, called the Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH), fails to account for various aspects of actual fluctuations that appear not to be connected to fundamentals. Behavioral finance (BF) allows for the condition that investors and managers are not always rational and may make systematic errors of judgment that affect market prices. At the extreme these errors are bubbles or crashes. We begin by identifying the respective assumptions of each finance model - EMH and BF and then explore practical, real-world examples of these two model assumptions in liquid markets by examining various investing biases and market frictions.

This course is about the evolution, current structure, and competitive dynamics of the global financial system – the network of services, geographies and institutions that constitutes the world’s financial architecture and plays a major role in determining global economic growth. The course has three parts – (1) a historical perspective on how the global financial system has evolved to create what we now have, (2) an overview of the principal global financial functions; global lending, debt and equity capital markets and market making, mergers and acquisitions advisory, and (3) a description of the current conditions that exist in key markets; the US, Europe, Asia, and the Emerging Markets. Throughout, there will be a focus on the competitive performance of the global, systemically important banks. and other major financial intermediaries, as well as the risks to which they are exposed and the challenges that they face.

The financial services industry touches all of our lives and has been going through a continuous transformation since the deregulation that began in the early 1970s. That evolution has accelerated in recent years as more and more pressure has been brought to bear by various stakeholders in the industry who have divergent goals and agendas. Those invested stakeholders include clients, investors, employees, regulators/politicians and the public at large. Overlaying all of this change has been rapid technological advancement that has had a direct impact on how the industry delivers its services, meets expected equity returns and manages the risk inherent in that delivery. This Course is an Advanced Finance Elective where THINKING not MEMORIZING is what it is all about.

The purpose of this course is to provide the student with a comprehensive understanding of both theory and practice in residential and commercial real estate debt and equity capital markets. These markets finance approximately two thirds of all residential debt in the US and about one quarter of all commercial real estate debt. They are also at the heart of the past real estate bubble, collapse and ensuing lackluster performance in the US economy. We will also discuss their role in the current re-inflation of residential and commercial real estate assets. The approach will be to make sure students first have a thorough grasp of the relevant theories and models used to value these assets and then to critique the limitations of these theories. As a final project, students will be grouped into teams and given residential and commercial real estate securities to analyze on a Bloomberg to make investment decisions.

This course provides turnaround, restructuring, and distressed investing skills that will expose you to, and prepare you for, careers in the industry. The focus is primarily on corporate reorganizations ranging from small/mid-size businesses to large corporations, including real estate and municipal turnarounds. Topics will include the identification of distressed opportunities; distressed research analysis; and the sourcing of distressed opportunities in the US, Europe, Latin America and Asia. We will also discuss workout strategies; the fundamentals of bankruptcy and the bankruptcy-reorganization process; and career opportunities in the distressed investment business. The class will culminate with students selecting a turnaround investment idea and presenting it to the class for consideration.

This accelerated course focuses on institutional real estate investment, primarily within the U.S. market. It covers real estate property level valuation and risk analysis in the context of four group cases spanning industrial, office, retail and multi-family development. These projects allow graduated skill development over the span of the course, an opportunity to apply financial and property market analysis, hone investment presentation skills, and develop skills and techniques to be an effective investment committee decision-maker. Depending on the level of prior student experience, the presenting “deal team” groups can focus on topics ranging from core market supply / demand forecasting, return sensitivity analysis, debt/equity optimization and/or sponsor/investor deal structuring features. While primarily relevant to those in the real estate equity and debt investment arena, skills and concepts are relevant across investment sectors. Prior real estate investment experience is not required.

This course is about financial markets and how financial assets (securities) are valued, used, and traded. The three main types of financial asset are considered in turn: equity (with a focus on portfolio management); debt (both Treasury and corporate); and, derivatives (call and put options and forward and futures contracts). For each type of financial asset, the course answers four questions: What is the payoff from holding the asset? Where and how is the asset traded? How is the asset valued? How is the asset used? The course introduces and expands upon several important theories for valuing assets: the CAPM and Intertemporal-CAPM for equity and corporate debt (including the Fama-French 3-factor asset pricing model); no-arbitrage pricing for Treasury debt instruments; the Black-Scholes option pricing model; and, forward-spot parity for forward contracts. Important finance researchers (Fama, Markowitz, Merton, Scholes, and Sharpe) have won Nobel prizes for developing many of the models that the course examines.

Climate change presents one of the central challenges of our generation, with a wide range of effects on financial markets and the broader economy. At the same time, financial markets play an important role in financing the transition to a net-zero economy. In this class, we study the interaction between climate change and firms, financial markets, energy markets, regulators, and policy makers. Given that climate change and sustainability issues more generally are affecting nearly every aspect of the corporate, regulatory, and non-profit worlds, the class will be valuable for students with a wide range of backgrounds and career goals, whether they are directly interested in climate and sustainability issues or primarily want to gain a better understanding of how these issues influence more traditional roles in the corporate and financial sector. The class is very applied in its outlook—for example, a range of guest speakers from industry, regulators, and nonprofits will visit the classroom—but we will frame the analysis through the lens of economic frameworks that help students think through the interactions between climate change and the broader economy in a systematic way. The objective is that the broad selection of topics and guest speakers will provide a variety of complementary perspectives on how climate change will shape economics and finance over the coming decades.

This course identifies and follows the wealth creation cycle that begins with company startups passes through successive stages of various kinds of private equity financing and ends with the harvesting of the created wealth through a sale or merger or initial public offering. Emphasis is placed on how entrepreneurial firms adapt financing and financial contracts to the information asymmetry problems the high degree of uncertainty and the conflicts of interest associated with startups.

Businesses and governments now face a growing and immediate array of nonfinancial risks, including climate-related, cyber and operational, geopolitical, and pandemic risks. Precisely because these critical risks are hard to measure and analyze, firms are putting both new and old resources – AI, data, people and money – to work to anticipate, manage and mitigate them. To address cybersecurity risks, for example, JP Morgan alone has 3000 employees and spends $600 million annually. Firms are only starting to grapple with existential climate-related and other risks. And startups are mushrooming to provide assessments to businesses. This course will study these risks alongside financial risks. It will outline frameworks for measuring, assessing and analyzing them, and for actions needed to meet them. We will examine case studies of climate, cyber, geopolitical and pandemic risks, including from current events. We will assess the spillovers among these risks, and why an integrated (e.g. enterprise-wide or system-wide) approach helps to manage them. Finally, we will study whether and how the information in financial markets can both inform the assessment of these risks and potentially provide tools to transfer, insure against or hedge them.

This course helps students develop an analytical framework for understanding how organizations make investment and financing decisions. Students also learn the theory and practice of various valuation techniques. There is an emphasis on understanding the theory and its applications to the real world as well as appreciating the limitations of the tools in practical settings. Specific topics include capital budgeting investment decision rules discounted cash flow valuation real options cost of capital capital structure dividend policy and valuation methods such as WACC and APV.

This course presents a comprehensive analysis of asset and liability restructuring Topics include industrial organization economics mergers and acquisitions divestitures corporate recapitalization bankruptcy and reorganization in and out of court workouts legal political and tax impacts on industries and multinational competition Agency theory issues and corporate governance are also considered

This 14-week, 3-credit PhD course presents research topics in the growing area of Household and Consumer Finance. Each week, we will read a number of a papers in one area of research within household finance. Most of the papers will be empirical, and in many weeks our discussions will focus on how the papers we read use various empirical strategies (instrumental variables estimation, differences-in-differences estimation, regression discontinuity estimation, field experiment) to identify causal effects. The topics are chosen to give students a broad overview of the types of topics under the “household finance” umbrella, and to introduce them both to seminal and to current research papers in the area.

The goal of this course is for students to understand how history, i.e., people and events of the past, have shaped the present-day financial system in the United States, which encompasses its markets, institutions, and regulatory frameworks.

Exponential growth in the availability of high quality real estate and real estate-related data is fueling a major shift in development, investment, and lending decision-making processes. In this highly applied course, students will be introduced to major data analysis and machine learning platforms; a wide range of public and private real estate and urban data sources; approaches to exploratory data analysis, real estate data visualization, and communication of findings; applied statistical modeling, including forecast modeling; and, emerging and prospective real estate applications for artificial intelligence and machine learning. Assessment will include case work focusing on real-world real estate decisions and coding assignments. While the data and applications for this course are principally in the real estate sector, the applied skills learned may be of interest for students across a wide range of industries.

This course is designed for students who have little or no prior knowledge of real estate Different aspects of real estate analysis are covered including finance taxation appraisal investment analysis development and property management A central focus is on the risk and return elements in commercial real estate financing and on how to modify the principles of corporate finance and investment theory to fit the specialized needs of real estate analysis Topics include liquidity problems buyer or seller informational asymmetries and interrelatedness of financing and investment decisions The growing role of international considerations the importance of securitized instruments and the changing roles of brokers are considered

This is the first course in the theory of financial decision making. Focus is primarily on individual decision making under certainty and uncertainty. Topics include valuation theory asset selection general portfolio theory asset pricing theory and general equilibrium in financial markets.

This is the second course in the theory of financial decision making. Focus is primarily on methods of empirical financial economics. Standard econometric procedures and the newest techniques in estimating procedures are studied in the context of applications to financial asset pricing and to corporate finance issues.

This is the third course in the theory of financial decision making. The first half of this course deals with issues in corporate finance. Topics include agency theory signaling and asymmetric information models taxes dividends and capital structure. The second half of the course focuses on the pricing of options futures and other derivative securities instruments.

This course presents a broad overview of the role of investment banking in modern societies: What functions are performed and how are these tasks carried out in competitive and noncompetitive environments. Topics covered include concepts such as origination syndication distribution of security issues, pricing of new issues, and the management of issues in the after markets, and the role of investment bankers in restructuring industry financing governments and facilitating saving and investment. Ethical issues investment bankers must face are considered.

This is the fourth course in the theory of financial decision making. The first half of this course deals with asset pricing and dynamic portfolio choice in a continuous-time framework. The second half of the course focuses on empirical financial economics with a special emphasis on the empirical implications of the Efficient Markets Hypothesis and asset pricing and applications to issues in investment performance measurement and corporate finance.

This course covers debt and equity secondary markets linked to real estate On the debt side we cover the securitization of residential and commercial mortgages and various types of fixed income instruments such as passthrough securities CMOs IOs POs CDOs etc We study the basics of modeling prepayment and default risk on these instruments We also discuss causes and consequences of the 2008 and ongoing financial crisis and implications of the crisis for the mortgage finance system On the equity side we study the legal foundations financial analysis and structuring of Real Estate Investment Trusts REITs which are the primary traded equity structure used for real estate The course will be a mix of formal lectures inclass exercises and guest lectures from Wall Street professionals.

This is a course designed to expose students to a wide range of investment philosophies in the special context of real estate investing Each week leading professionals or academics speak on a particular approach to real estate investing how it is put into practice and the extent to which it is successful.

While commercial real estate development, asset management, and the legal and tax framework of investment and lending remain inherently local features of a worldwide sector valued at more than $300 trillion, institutional real estate equity and debt capital flows have become increasingly global over the last several decades. For students seeking careers in the institutional real estate industry in New York and other global cities, interaction with cross-border investors, lenders, property technology entrepreneurs, and others will be the norm rather than the exception. This course introduces students to real estate finance and investment analysis in non-US settings, special issues when deploying equity and debt capital internationally, and approaches to analyzing global real estate portfolios. The highly experiential course is structured around direct interaction with global real estate developers, investors, lenders, and policymakers in a major non-US market, supplemented by pre-departure meetings in December and January, local site visits, and case-based deliverables.

This course analyzes the major financial decisions facing corporate managers. The major topics include investment valuation (capital budgeting), capital structure and dividend policy, and mergers and acquisitions. There will be emphasis on both developing the tools and mindset of the financial practitioner as well as examining specific applications in the form of examples but we will spend a lot of time with case discussions as well. The purpose is to see the concepts of capital structure applied in real world situations – With both more breadth and depth than in the intro corporate finance class. We will end the course discussing more advanced topics such as Real Options and Behavioral Finance.

Financial Theory V

Climate change presents one of the central challenges of our generation, with a wide range of possible effects on financial markets and the broader economy. This class: (i) Thinks about the effect of climate change on the overall economy; (ii) Studies the risks and opportunities that climate change holds for firms and financial institutions (distinguishing between a variety of types of risk, including transition risk and regulatory risk); (iii) Discusses how financial markets can help transfer and hedge climate risk; (iv) Explores the economic and financial foundations of potential climate regulation; (v) Analyzes how climate risk interacts with other risks, such as the risk of future pandemics.

The goal of the course is to analyze the interplay of Sustainability and Finance and the related new risks and opportunities. In fact, the intersection of ESG and Financial issues generates new risks over longer risk horizons, which should be factored into company valuation frameworks from fundamental analysis. However, understanding, measuring, and pricing these new sources of risk, and also assessing the related opportunities, presents challenges due to the wide breadth of ESG-related issues coupled with data limitations.

Businesses and governments now face a growing and immediate array of nonfinancial risks, including climate-related, cyber and operational, and geopolitical risks. Precisely because these critical risks are hard to measure and analyze, firms are putting new resources – people and money– to work to anticipate, manage and mitigate them. To address cybersecurity risks, for example, JP Morgan alone has 3000 employees and spends $600 million annually. Firms are only starting to grapple with existential climate-related risks. And startups are mushrooming to provide assessments to businesses. This course will study these risks alongside financial risks. It will outline frameworks for measuring, assessing and analyzing them, and for actions needed to meet them. We will examine case studies of climate, cyber and geopolitical risks, including from current events. Finally, we will study whether and how the information in financial markets can both inform the assessment of these risks and potentially provide tools to transfer, insure against or hedge them.

This course is designed to offer a thorough understanding of Value Investing principles and techniques from the perspective of professional practitioners. The course aims to prepare students to understand, evaluate, and invest using a Global Value Investment Philosophy in all asset classes (i.e. Securities, Real Estate, and Hard Assets). Students will be exposed to Value Investment Valuation methods, strategies and techniques. The course will feature a combination of lectures by the professor and guest speakers who are expert in different facets of the Value Investing paradigm. An important part of the course is a term project for each student to prepare an investment analysis and oral presentation (or pitch) to a panel of investment professionals. The top investment ideas from the class will be purchased in a real money endowment fund held by Stern. Once investments are ongoing, the class will also be responsible for evaluating past performance and updating past buy decisions to determine whether these holdings continue to meet Value Investing principles and should remain as a holding in the Fund.

This course introduces the institutions, instruments, and empirical regularities of Chinese financial markets and the role these markets play in the broader Chinese economy. The goal of the course is to provide students with a comprehensive understanding of Chinese financial markets. It focuses on current issues and debates about Chinese financial markets, including the Chinese banking system, RMB exchange rates, Chinese stock markets and bond markets, mutual fund and hedge fund industry, Chinese derivative markets and other important topics. The similarities and differences between Chinese financial markets and more developed markets will be highlighted.

The course explores the theoretical foundation and practical applications of international investment. Topics include international diversification for strategic asset allocation, currency hedging and management, global macro investment, risk management for international investment, fundamental and quantitative security selection in the international context with a special focus on emerging markets such as China. The international investment topics will be discussed in the practical and evolving context of current global institutional investment landscape with case studies on leading institutional investors such as Yale Endowment, CPPIB and Norges Bank Investment Management.

The most fascinating aspect of financial market prices is their volatility Students will learn how to measure and forecast financial volatility They will become proficient with ARCHGARCH models exponential smoothing and historical volatilities These tools will be used to measure risk and analyze alternative approaches to calculating Value at Risk Implied volatilities from options will be introduced and compared statistically and economically Then the course will turn to the multiasset problem and discuss traditional and new approaches to measuring and forecasting correlations These tools will be applied to the problem of dynamic portfolio selection and risk control.

TOPICS IN CREDIT RISK

The course is taught entirely by the case method and requires active participation by all of the students in each class It is designed to give students a strong ability to understand the key factors that determine the equity value and competitive prospects for most types of media and entertainment companies as well as the multinational integrated giants that have emerged after 20 years of consolidation The case will draw heavily on publicly available materials and recent case studies of success and spectacular failure

This course is designed for students who intend to pursue careers across the investment banking industry as well as those exploring careers in corporate strategy and management. Areas covered include equity and debt analysis, mergers and acquisitions, and corporate strategy. While the core of the course is corporate finance, the issues encompass strategy, marketing, and economics aspects. Students will learn the unique characteristics of telecom, media and technology companies/industries while building on fundamental analytical skills by examining a series of landmark and potential corporate transactions in telecom, media & technology industries to understand how TMT companies respond to secular changes and transform their business models in the midst of evolving ecosystems. Cases discussed/analyzed include: CBS vs. Viacom; NFL’s Digital Media Initiatives; AT&T, DirecTV and Time Warner; Tesla; Alphabet vs. Apple; Amazon Web Services, Twitch, Waymo and Instagram.

Finance theory has long relied on a descriptively sparse model of behavior based on the premise that investors and managers are rational Another critical assumption is that misjudgments by investors and managers are penalized swiftly in competitive markets In recent years both assumptions have been questioned as the standard model fails to account for various aspects of actual markets Behavioral finance which allows that investors and managers are not always rational and may make systematic errors of judgment that affect market prices has emerged as a credible alternative to the standard model This course provides an exposition of the insights and implications of behavioral finance theory showing how it can explain otherwise puzzling features of asset prices and corporate finance Notwithstanding the inroads of the new theory the standard model retains strong support amongst many academics practitioners who make criticisms of behavioral finance that deserve serious consideration An important challenge that we will address in this course is identifying the respective domains of each perspective and whether there are tradable opportunities

This course covers the theoretical and practical aspects of futures, options, and other derivative instruments, which have become some of the most important tools of modern finance. While the primary focus is on financial derivatives, contracts based on commodities, credit risk, and other nonfinancial variables are also covered. Topics include market institutions and trading practices, valuation models, hedging, and other risk management techniques. The course requires relatively extensive use of quantitative methods and theoretical reasoning.

This course will explore the world of activist investing. The first half will explore significant historical cases and the second half will have you working on live campaigns, each of which contains a unique set of circumstances and lessons to be learned. We will look through the lens of the investors in each campaign, identifying the opportunity that they saw and how they went about enacting change. Throughout the term, we will focus on the key aspects of activist investing including: identifying different reasons for underperformance, the most common requests of activist investors, and the tactics used to achieve their goals.

This class will examine the science and economics of climate change. We rely heavily on financial models to understand the linkages between the risk of climate change which may become manifest over the very long term and the behavior of today’s stock market, as well as how various economic policies might impact climate change (and then reflected in current asset prices), and how agents might use asset allocation choices or financial contracts to hedge their exposure to climate change risk. The course divides naturally into several major themes – the science of climate change, the economics of climate change, policy responses to climate change, portfolio choices and tools to mitigate climate risks. Common economic examples of externalities and regulation will be used to frame the analysis. From this point of view, portfolio choices and asset prices will be examined. The short run and long run costs of divesting fossil fuel stocks will be considered. Discount rates play a key role and will be discussed in detail. Students will be required to prepare a write-up for one article from each week’s required readings. The course may include invited speakers and short videos. A short quiz, a final exam and class participation are also inputs to the final grade.

PLEASE NOTE: This course is the same as Topics in Investments FINC-GB 3176 Finance Analysis Healthcare. You should not take this class if you have already taken this topic. The course is taught by a mixture of lecture, discussion, and case method. The course is led by Dr. Wong, alongside members of his investment team, as well as guest speakers. Students will be taught a framework for critically evaluating and valuing healthcare businesses, with a focus upon drug/biotech and medtech companies. The course will seek to sensitize students to common risks/pitfalls in life science investing. Issues that may impact the industry in the future will also be highlighted. Students should be aware that there will be some limited reading of scientific literature for the class.

This course applies concepts and techniques of financial economics to actual situations in the world of corporate finance This course covers financing decisions investment decisions M A and financial restructuring Some of this is explored in international settings For each class meeting discussion questions are assigned concerning a case study These questions and the material in the case are considered for most of the class period.

This course examines the private equity marketplace. Private equity has become a major source of capital for both new ventures and established firms. The focus of the course changes from semester to semester. Possible topics include capital needs and the role of private equity venture capital and leveraged buyout financing the roles of investor groups such as limited partners sponsors portfolio company managers and institutions and valuation and risk issues for private finance.

This course provides institutional background and details necessary to deal with the venture capital and new issues markets Examines basic valuation issues appropriate capital structure the value of liquidity and the value of control Also considers the intangible aspects of entrepreneurship and venture capital forms of financing.

Topics vary from semester to semester check registration information and department bulletin boards for current offerings Topics cover professional issues in the design and use of financial instruments or in developing financial markets Students may only elect this course once in their degree program.

A cryptocurrency is an emerging asset class representing the intersection of disruptive early stage technology, liquid capital markets and new use cases and business models. This class focuses on understanding the investment implications of the cryptocurrencies being created at this intersection point. As of December 2017, over 1000 tokens were listed on exchanges throughout the world with Bitcoin and Ether being the two largest in market capitalization terms. The total capitalization of cryptocurrencies expanded by more than a factor of 10 in 2017. This in turn has led to expanded media coverage and debate concerning cryptocurrency’s role and value to society. The academic objectives of this course are threefold. (1) To explore the fundamental aspects of cryptocurrencies and the liquid markets they operate in (2) To test select psychological biases/heuristics associated with these cryptocurrencies and the regulatory dynamics overlaid on it and (3) To discuss practical implications of investing in these cryptocurrencies from limits to arbitrage to portfolio impacts across a range of asset classes.

Advanced professional strategies for managing portfolios and evaluating financial instruments are examined. Topics range from arbitrage trading strategies to contrarian investing to issues in public pension fund management. Taught by leading Wall Street professionals and senior faculty members.

This course will prepare students to understand, evaluate, and invest using a global value investment philosophy across all asset classes (i.e. securities, real estate, and hard assets). Students will be exposed to value investment valuation methods, strategies and techniques. The course will use a combination of lectures, reading assignments, and guest lectures.

Project finance is used to finance billions of dollars of capital intensive projects annually This increasingly critical financial technique relies on the cash flows of a specific project not the cash flows of a corporation or third party guarantor to service debt and provide investor returns Not all projects can support project financing Project finance is a specialized financial tool requiring both proper structuring and risk mitigation The purpose of the course is to understand what project finance is why it is used and how it is used Students will learn what the necessary elements are that support the use of project finance to include contractual agreements technology sponsors risk identification and mitigation sources of capital financial structuring the use of financial modeling accounting considerations and tax considerations.

This course examines selected topics in mergers and acquisitions from the viewpoint of finance Basic theory and empirical findings form the base for discussing such issues as merger strategy defensive measures in merger the valuation of firms as a whole under differing management strategies and the impact of financing considerations on various stakeholders.

The practical and theoretical implications of bankruptcy and distressed restructuring are examined in this course. Focus is primarily on corporate form organizations ranging from banks to retail firms to manufacturers. Topics include valuation effects of bankruptcy workout strategies the bankruptcy reorganization process from the view point of different participants and the implications of bankruptcy for banks workers and state and national industrial policy.

The course will provide an overview of the bankruptcy and reorganization process as it currently exists for large companies in the United States. The purposes of the course are a) to examine the bankruptcy process from the perspectives of a securities analysis when a bankrupt company securities a good or bad investment b) capital structure choices company management and creditor actions to select a post bankruptcy capital structure c) uses and abuses of the bankruptcy process from the perspectives of management and creditors, and d) prepackaged bankruptcies and out of court restructurings contests for corporate control within the bankruptcy process.

This course examines the private equity marketplace. Private equity is a significant source of capital for both new ventures and established firms. Private equity is the investment of capital in private companies to fund growth or in public companies to take them private.

This course covers digital currencies, blockchains, and related topics in the FinTech area, perhaps the most significant innovation in the financial world since the advent of double entry bookkeeping centuries ago. The technology appears to represent an existential challenge for major parts of the finance industry. It is now commonly suggested by experts such as McKinsey that commercial banks and stock exchanges may no longer exist, or may become much smaller, within the next 10 to 20 years, with increasing volumes of payments and exchange taking place on a peer to peer basis.

This course covers a broad range of issues in corporate financial management. We analyze the core financial decisions made by firms, the investment decision and the financing decision, and examine their impact on the value of the firm in the financial market. Topics that will be covered are: financial planning and forecasting, project analysis and evaluation, resource allocation within firms, valuing flexibility in investment projects, capital structure policy and cost of capital, payout policy, corporate restructurings and firm valuation. A large emphasis will be placed on the application of the concepts and tools developed in the course to financial decisions made by firms through case analysis and real-world examples. By the end of the course, participants should feel comfortable performing a sound analysis of a variety of corporate decisions, and should have developed a thorough understanding of how analyzing strategic and financial decisions from the perspective of value creation can improve managerial decision-making.

This is a case-based mini-course intended to provide an in-depth conceptual and practical guide to domestic and international wealth management for high net worth individuals and families who now control directly or indirectly a majority of the world’s financial assets. The global market for wealth management has grown rapidly in recent decades and is likely to continue to be one of the most dynamic dimensions of the financial services sector, even as growth shifts location to new areas of wealth accumulation, notably Asia-Pacific, parts of Latin America, Russia and the Middle East. Besides growth, private banking remains one of the most valuable franchises of the global financial services industry, based on key client relationships, creativity in product development, and earnings stability. The course provides valuable frameworks from three distinct perspectives: the wealthy individual, the private banker/client advisor and the wealth management firm.

This course applies concepts and techniques of financial economics to actual situations in the world of corporate finance. This course covers financing decisions, investment decisions, M & A, and financial restructuring. Some of this is explored in international settings. For each class meeting, discussion questions are assigned concerning a case study. These questions and the material in the case are considered for most of the class period.

This course is designed to take an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the problems of formulating and implementing successful acquisition strategies. Our major objectives are (1) to enable you to act as a senior advisor to your CEO regarding strategic M&A and shareholder value issues your division or company might confront and (2) to assist you in becoming an informed consumer of just about anything written on M&A success (including pitches by professional services providers). We will introduce a framework for thinking about acquisitions as a strategic investment where the bottom line is superior shareholder performance. The course will approach acquisitions as a multi-step strategic and organizational process drawing from the fields of strategy, negotiations, finance and organizational behavior.

The objective of the course is to provide an introduction as well as an in-depth understanding of single-name derivative products, primarily the single-name credit default swaps (CDS), as also index products, with a focus on sovereign CDS index products. In addition, we will discuss other forms of credit derivatives such as Collateralized Loan Obligations, which issue bonds backed by a basket of leveraged loans. As with any derivatives course, the idea is to learn the key arbitrages between derivatives and cash markets well so that one knows when the arbitrage breaks down! Hence, the objective is to provide a balance between developing, on one hand, a sound conceptual framework and, on the other, market understanding and insight, especially with respect to liquidity and counterparty risk effects that are often so important in markets from a practitioner’s standpoint. I regard both as essential to the informed practitioner and academic. We will apply the tools by studying signs of market stress during the COVID-19 crisis and how Fed interventions alleviated the market turmoil in that period. In particular, the liquidity in the markets for government bonds will become important to understand as well, especially as COVID stimulus is being withdrawn. Along the way, we will look at methods to quantify the systemic risk of the financial sector and regulatory as well as market-based stress-testing of financial firms. Finally, we will also pay some attention to the ongoing concerns around zombie lending to corporates by bond markets given the Quantitative Easing by central banks both pre-COVID and post-COVID.

Managing Investment Funds is a capstone course that requires students to draw on their knowledge of finance as well as macroeconomics accounting competitive analysis strategy marketing and other fields to manage a million endowment fund held by New York University. In addition to honing their analytical skills by organizing all activities related to institutional asset management students gain experience in financial writing and oral presentations advancing financial decisions in a group setting and handling all of the governance and fiduciary responsibilities of a university endowment fund. The central mission of this course is for students to learn through having practical hands-on investment management experience. Because of the time requirements in formulating an investment strategy screening and reviewing prospective stocks updating the status and performance of existing positions and all of the ancillary duties connected with the operation of a real live portfolio the experiential or hands-on component consumes the bulk of class time However a related mission is for students to acquire knowledge about institutional funds management and current industry practices and trends. This more traditional learning experience comes through readings and presentations from industry professionals. The endowment funds under management operate as the Michael Price Student Investment Fund MPSIF. The Fund began in early 2000 thanks to a generous gift from Michael F Price. During its short life MPSIF has been a very popular course that helps Stern students to differentiate themselves by providing valuable experience for careers in asset management and related fields. For more detailed information about MPSIF see the website at stern.nyu.edu/~mpsif and in particular The MPSIF Guidebook that is available at the site.

The class describes some of the main strategies used by hedge funds and proprietary traders and provides a methodology to analyze them In class and through exercises the strategies are illustrated using real data and students learn to use back testing to evaluate a strategy The class also covers institutional issues related to short selling liquidity margin requirements risk management and performance measurement The strategies returns are adjusted for illiquidity and their risks are evaluated including the risk forced liquidation due to margin constraints.

Digital currencies, blockchains, cryptographic tokens, and related topics in the FinTech area; legacy payment and banking systems; stateless, decentralized, cloud-based digital currency systems; initial coin offerings and the extension of cryptocurrency-based technology into securities issuance and trading; hacking, “smart contracts,” governance, and emerging regulatory approaches.

This is a class about valuation. It starts by laying the foundations of value and pricing, but the bulk of the class is spent on applications, rather than theory. It is about valuing small businesses and big ones, simple businesses and complex ones, young firms, and those in distress. It is about valuing individual assets, as well as portfolios, and it looks at valuation from every conceivable perspective, as an investor, a trader, a business owner, or a manager. It is about valuation in all its many forms and by the end of this class, you should be able to value just about anything that has a value and price just about everything else. 

Builds on the conceptual foundations of the portfolio material introduced in Foundations of Finance Course focuses on methods of constructing and evaluating portfolios in a variety of settings Topics include complex portfolio objectives alternative implementation strategies measurement of portfolio performance the role of computers and asset allocation schemes in risk management and the macromarket impacts of portfolio strategies.

Covers the valuation of fixed income securities and investment strategies utilizing them. Topics include the mathematics of bond valuation, immunization, history of interest rate structures, varieties of debt instruments, default and country risk considerations The role of financial futures and options on bond portfolio strategies is analyzed as well as more traditional approaches to debt portfolio strategies.

Covers derivative securities and markets The primary focus is on financial futures and options but there is also reference to the extensive markets in commodity market instruments Topics include market institutions and trading practices valuation models hedging and risk management techniques and the application of contingent claims analysis to contracts with option type characteristics The material is inherently more quantitative than in some other courses.

This class will focus on the legal and financial aspects of M and A both hostile and friendly transactions involving strategic and financial players and distressed restructuring. It is intended to integrate diverse aspects of the academic training of law and business students in a transactionally focused practically oriented class.The course will consist of lectures by the co-instructors presentations by guest speakers and team presentations by the students. The lectures will provide a foundation with respect to the legal and financial aspects of M and A and bankruptcy. The guest presentations will focus on the role played by bankers lawyers and other professionals in the M and A and restructuring process. The student presentations which will be done by teams consisting of a mix of law and business students will analyze current M and A and restructuring transactions using the tools and techniques discussed earlier in the course. Each student will also be required to write a 12-15 page term paper on a topic approved by the Instructors.Evaluation will be based upon the team presentations and each student term paper class participation and other overall contribution to the class.

Impact investments are made with the intention of generating social and environmental impact in addition to a financial return. This course targets students who want to better understand how investment mechanisms can be structured to solve critical social and environmental challenges and to be well positioned to work in the expanding impact investing industry.

This course will focus on the practical aspects of counseling and managing financial institutions to deal with the changing regulatory landscape brought on by the financial crisis of 2008 We will explore the causes of the financial crisis the historical drivers of profitability at financial institutions and how DoddFrank may impact those drivers going forward The course will not be limited to examining DoddFrank We will often look at case studies of business strategies and crisis management and discuss whether the strategies employed by financial institutions and the advice they were given yielded optimal results We will consider these cases in the light of the unique impact reputational risk has on financial institutions and how that impacts their ability to withstand regulatory scrutiny and proceedings and how good counsel and management is often critical to the survival of financial businesses during periods of crisis Cases studies will also examine how to deal with conflicts of interest and how executives and counsel should think about dealing with their regulators We will also consider the importance of culture at a financial institution and how compensation and supervisory practices should be developed to be consistent with and encourage that culture And we will also explore what is meant by shadow banking and its impact on financial institutions T he course will use current events in addition to the syllabus Students are strongly encouraged to read the financial news since classroom discussion will often be based on current issues which we believe provide teaching opportunities The course will be a combination of classroom lectures and outside speakers who are experienced in fields such as financial analysis crisis management management of financial institutions including some that failed We expect the outside speakers will give you insights into the practical solutions which lawyers and management are called upon to provide Occasionally we will include videos in the readings for class and for the first class students will be required to view the HBO movie Too Big To Fail

Investing for social and environmental impact is gaining wider acceptance within the institutional investment community. Many pension funds and endowments have sizeable holdings in environmental, social, and governance (ESG) related investments and integrate ESG strategies into their portfolios. Building on a companion course (FINC-GB.3348) that surveys the principles and techniques of impact investing, this seminar-style course offers students an opportunity to develop their knowledge of impact investing using a complementary approach. This course combines the experience of a semester-long consulting engagement focused on a live impact investing opportunity or challenge facing a family office with classroom lectures, case discussions and expert guest speakers from the impact investing field.

This is a case-based course intended to provide an in-depth conceptual and practical guide to domestic and international wealth management for high net worth individuals and families. The global market for wealth management has grown rapidly in recent decades and is likely to continue to be one of the most dynamic dimensions of the financial services sector, even as growth shifts location to new areas of wealth accumulation. Besides growth, private banking remains one of the most valuable franchises of the global financial services industry, based on key client relationships, creativity in product development, and earnings stability.

This full-credit course provides an Introduction to DeFi – What, Why, When, How? and explicitly focuses on the DeFi stack & Dapps that run on Ethereum (ETH), as it is the oldest chain for DeFi and also has the most capital locked into those protocols (TVL) – approximately 70% share. We will discuss key applications given ETH’s composability as well as unique DeFi risks & regulations compared to Traditional Finance (TradeFi).

This course identifies and follows the wealth creation cycle that begins with company startups, passes through successive stages of various kinds of private equity financing, and ends with the harvesting of the created wealth through a sale or merger or initial public offering. Emphasis is placed on how entrepreneurial firms adapt financing and financial contracts to the information asymmetry problems the high degree of uncertainty and the conflicts of interest associated with startups.

ENTRPRNRL FINANCE:FINTECH

This course will survey the private equity industry and provide an understanding of the origination, valuation, execution, monitoring, and realization of private equity transactions and of the process of investing in private equity funds. The course will include a series of lectures designed to teach specific skills and concepts used in the practice of private equity and case discussions through which those skills and concepts will be illustrated and utilized.

Independent Study

Independent Study

This course focuses on financing entrepreneurial companies especially startup and early stage ventures Its overall aim is to understand how entrepreneurs and their financial backers can spot and create value This involves learning about the following topics that trace out the venture capital cycle opportunity recognition how to tell a great opportunity from a mere good idea valuation and evaluation placing a value on the opportunity for funding purposes negotiating funding structuring the financing contract so as to avoid conflict before it arises and optimize performance incentives managing the investment helping the entrepreneur in nonfinancial matters and safeguarding the investment and exit taking the investee company public in an IPO selling it to management or a trade buyer or closing it down If we want to understand how venture capitalists VCs create value in this cycle and how they interact with entrepreneurs we also need to understand the VC own incentives and constraints These are linked to the fundraising cycle and the structure of a fund VCs are continually raising new funds and the terms on which they do so influences their behavior For an entrepreneur it is critical to understand how This implies that we will explore new venture financing from a number of different perspectives the entrepreneur the venture capitalist that of the investors backing the VC such as pension funds and college endowments and stock market investors at the IPO This course is not open to students taking or having taken Entrepreneurial Finance B40.3361 While the two courses cover similar ground in some lectures New Venture Financing focuses more heavily on startups and the workings of the venture capital industry.

The perspective in this course is that of an investment manager who may be responsible for investment portfolios at a bank an insurance company a pension or endowment fund or personal trust or a mutual fund Emerging financial markets around the world are examined Problems considered include political risk currency risk excess speculation or market manipulation differing accounting rules and standards and performance measure comparison standards Financial investments considered range from stocks to bonds to derivatives to real estate Class discussion and reading focus on both the theoretical background and the practical knowledge necessary to deal effectively with the risks and opportunities that are a part of emerging financial markets.

This will be another in our collection of joint Law School Stern courses It will cover both legal and business aspects of Bankruptcy and Reorganization with of necessity less depth and detail than either a pure Law or Stern course The class will be a mixture of lectures team projects and outside speakers with a primary focus on the transactional aspects of the subject matter.

Research Practicum-Finc

Research Pract - Finc II

Research Practicum-Finc 3

Research Practicum-Finc 4

RESEARCH PRACTICUM-FINC 5

Seminar in Derivatives

Teaching Practicum-Fin

This is a finance PhD course on financial intermediation. It covers recent theoretical and empirical research in financial intermediation.

Suitable for Finance and Economics PhD students as an elective course after having done the main Econ sequence. Can also be considered by advanced research-oriented undergraduate and MBA students.

The class covers advanced topics on the interaction of macroeconomics monetary economics banking and international finance The first half of the class section 1 and 2 will cover the most important building blocks of macro finance The second half of the class will discuss topics for ongoing and future research.

The goal of this course is for students to understand how history, i.e., people and events of the past, have shaped the present-day financial system in the United States, which encompasses its markets, institutions, and regulatory frameworks.

The course is designed students with a strong interest in real estate capital markets. Its target audience is students specializing in Real Estate, for whom this is a capstone course, but is also open to finance-oriented students who wish to gain an in-depth understanding of real estate investment analysis. Topics covered will span the real estate equity and debt markets, both public and private. The bulk of the course focuses on commercial real estate, but we will spend some time studying the housing markets. There are three major sections in the course: Structured finance and the CMBS market, REITs and Publicly-Traded Real Estate, the Private Real Estate Market. The class will contain a mixture of standard lectures, guest speakers, and case discussions. It will meet once per week for three hours to accommodate the relatively high number of outside speakers and cases in the course.

Exponential growth in the availability of high quality real estate and real estate-related data is fueling a major shift in development, investment, and lending decision-making processes. In this highly applied course, students will be introduced to major data analysis and machine learning platforms; a wide range of public and private real estate and urban data sources; approaches to exploratory data analysis, real estate data visualization, and communication of findings; applied statistical modeling, including forecast modeling; and, emerging and prospective real estate applications for artificial intelligence and machine learning. Assessment will include case work focusing on real-world real estate decisions and coding assignments. While the data and applications for this course are principally in the real estate sector, the applied skills learned may be of interest for students across a wide range of industries.

This course introduces students to real estate securitization from both an equity and debt perspective. It analyzes alternative types of equity securitization vehicles including real estate investment trusts (REITs), commingled real estate funds (CREFs), real estate limited partnerships (RELPs), master limited partnerships (MLPs), and real estate swaps. The course also introduces students to mortgage-backed securities (MBSs) as an example of real estate debt securitization, and explores differences in their cash flows, prepayment, and default probabilities. It discusses the dynamics of mortgage prepayments and pricing the embedded call option in a mortgage, followed by real-world applications. Students explore such mortgage derivatives as mortgage pass-throughs, interest-only and principal-only strips, floaters and inverse floaters, and various types of collateralized mortgage obligations such as planned amortization classes.

This course covers the theory and measurement of return and risk on real estate financial decisions. Topics include loan valuation theory, determination of future costs, discounting procedures for cash flows of income-producing properties, and utilization of negative cash flows. Finance theory is applied to real estate decisions regarding land subdivision, property development, lender strategies, and the role of government agencies in real estate.

This course examines the lifecycle of high-growth new ventures (i.e. startups), with a focus on how they are funded. We will follow a successful startup’s path from founding through the stages of new venture finance. These include developing a business plan and its financials, the core skills of valuation, the venture capital industry, and how entrepreneurs and investors realize returns. Through examples of specific companies and technologies, we will also learn about the emerging landscape of financial technology (fintech) startups. We will consider the following subsectors, where startups are either seeking to displace incumbents or sell them their services: personal finance, blockchain, equity crowdfunding, lending (peer-to-peer and AI-augmented), payments, insurance, institutional investment, and money transfer.

Businesses and governments now face a growing and immediate array of nonfinancial risks, including climate-related, cyber and operational, and geopolitical risks. Precisely because these critical risks are hard to measure and analyze, firms are putting new resources – people and money– to work to anticipate, manage and mitigate them. To address cybersecurity risks, for example, JP Morgan

The objective of the course is to provide an introduction as well as an in-depth understanding of single-name derivative products, primarily the single-name credit default swaps (CDS), as also index products, with a focus on sovereign CDS and index products. We will apply the tools by studying signs of market stress during the COVID-19 crisis and how Fed interventions alleviated the market turmoil in that period. In particular, the liquidity in the markets for government bonds will become important to understand as well. Along the way, we will look at methods to quantify the systemic risk of the financial sector and regulatory as well as market-based stress-testing of financial firms. Finally, we will also pay some attention to the ongoing concerns around zombie lending to corporates by bond markets given the central bank backstop post COVID.

Dissertation Seminar Finance

DISSERTATION SEM FINANCE