Ethics seems to be something subjective and something optional you can do but you don't have to do. If we analyze the logic of business, this first impression appears misleading.
Consider the case of Starbucks. The company were very pleased with the business in the UK and described it as profitable for many stakeholders but they did not pay taxes for years using legal tax avoidance tactics. This happened about ten years ago and led to a public boycott of the products with a long lasting harm for the company. Starbucks still suffers continuous public observation and criticism for their tax paying behaviour. Whatever they do, they are suspicious.
- Dozent/in: László Kovács
COURSE SUMMARY:
VALUING SECURITIES & COMPANIES
The course on VALUING SECURITIES & COMPANIES will discuss the fundamental principles of corporate finance. These include investment decisions as well as financing decisions.
The course is also a prerequisite for the 2nd term lecture CORPORATE FINANCE & VALUATION and for the intensive lectures of the 3rd term like ADVANCED M&A and ADVANCED M&A & VALUATION - CASE STUDIES.
COURSE METHODOLOGY
The scientific framework of the course VALUING SECURITIES & COMPANIES is build upon the following corner stones:
Valuation of securities and companies
- The purpose, the goals and the governance of the firm
- The tao of valuation (methodologies): The NPV and IRR concepts
- Debt capital markets: Valuing bonds
- Equity capital markets: Valuing stocks
- Alternative investment methodologies to NPV
- Valuing investment decisions and projects
- Introduction to the valuation of companies (Basic Enterprise-DCF valuation approach)
Portfolio theory: Risk, return and the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM):
- Risk & return
- Portfolio theory & Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM)
- Risk & cost of capital (WACC, leveraged and un-levered cost of equity, beta, et al)
COURSE LOGISTICS, TIMING & CORE LITERATURE
Lectures will be on-campus every Monday from 8:00 am to 11:20 am (room W1.09). Lectures will start on October 09, 2023.
Literally, to be up to date in financial market matters is a must for our lectures. Therefore, reading the ECONOMIST (weekly) and the FINANCIAL TIMES (daily) is mandatory. Besides, we will use a bunch of latest scientific articles (as will be discussed during the lectures).
For the lectures the core text books will be:
- BREALEY, MYERS, ALLAN: PRINCIPLES OF CORPORATE FINANCE (2023). WILEY. and
- FEIX, T. (2021). VALUING DIGITAL BUSINESS DESIGNS & PLATFORMS - AN INTEGRATED STRATEGIC AND FINANCIAL VALUATION FRAMEWORK. SPRINGER GLOBAL BOOK SERIES ON "THE FUTURE OF BUSINESS & FINANCE".
It is intended to supplement the lectures by selected best practice presentations of blue chip M&A houses, strategy consultants and corporate finance, M&A as well as strategy departments of international corporations.
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
You should invariably read the assigned chapters, articles, and supplementary materials before you come to class and go over the assigned exercises and cases. Students are expected to carefully review the assigned reading materials before each session, diligently work on the assigned problems, pertinent questions, and cases, and to participate actively in the class discussions. You should be prepared to spend some time to digest the material, to work on the assignments and case studies. After the end of each session, you should review your notes.
I would like to invite you to create together with YOU an inclusive classroom and engaging learning environment where we will explore intellectual curiosity with respect, candor, courtesy, and courage! Contradicting views and perspectives are highly welcomed, at least if they are grounded on a reasonable argumentation line. Already in our first session we will confront the argumentation of the Harvard Business Review with a thought-provoking article of the Economist on the modern purpose of the firm.
Let's move...
- Dozent/in: Thorsten Feix
This course contains additional material on how to research and write a
scientific paper. This will be in particular helpful for those IBF
students who did not write a Bachelor thesis during their undergraduate
studies.
- Dozent/in: Michael Feucht
"Financial Market Decisions" is a
6 ECTS/4 contact hours mandatory module in the first semester of our
International Business and Finance master programme. Students understand
the essentials of mathematical decision theory as well as the
psychological aspects of market participant behavior. They critically
reflect the concepts for performance and risk measurement which are used
to support decision taking in financial markets. They understand how to
implement the concepts with real market data in the programming
language R.
We will have face-2-face classroom sessions on Mondays in the
afternoon (2 to 5 pm) and virtual meetings in Zoom on Wednesday mornings from 8 to 9.30 am. For details please
refer to the syllabus.
Your grade will be determined by a
final exam before Christmas. Bonus points (in total up to 50%) towards
the final exam may be earned via
- DataCamp certificates for online self-study (20%) - each 4- to 5-hour certificate contribute 2 percentage points, the three introductory courses contribute 1 percentage point,
- a research paper on a historical case of market failure (20%) and
- the presentation of your paper (10%) in December.
- Dozent/in: Michael Feucht
Corporate Governance is the legal and factual framework for the management and supervision of a company. Incomplete
contracts and differing interests principally provide opportunities for
stakeholders as well as motives for opportunistic behavior. In
this course we will discuss principles on corporate governance that
have the task of restricting the leeway and motivations of the actors
for opportunistic behavior through appropriate arrangements.
- Dozent/in: Stephan Zimmermann
Managing People will give students an overview about classical areas of International Human Resource Management, including some insights into behavioral psychology and general management topics like leadership and intercultural management.
This course will be held online on Wednesdays afternoon from 14:00-17:00h. Eventual Zoom data can be found in the course.
- Dozent/in: Michael Freiboth
Topics: In this class, we will look at financial economics from a microeconomic as well as a macroeconomic perspective. Furthermore, we will discuss policies related to financial economics issues. Regarding the microeconomic aspects of financial economics, we will address questions such as: What are the functions of financial systems? Which problems could arise and how can those be addressed? How do firms, institutions and regulatory agencies try to ensure that the financial system works? Why is the regulation of financial systems so important? With respect to the macroeconomic aspects of financial economics, we will address questions such as: How does monetary policy work and how does monetary policy impact financial markets and the economy? What are the effects of monetary policy tools such as quantitative easing? What kind of exchange rate system should a country chose and what are the consequences for monetary policy? In terms of policies related to financial markets, we will address questions such as: What are important institutions in the international financial system? Why can a financial crisis occur and what could be measures to deal with a financial crisis? Should central banks pursue green monetary policy? What are current pressing issues regarding global financial stability and by which policies can such problems be addressed?
Date: Wednesdays, 09:40-13:00, W3.05
Assessment and contribution to module mark: written exam
Credits: 4 SWS / 6 CPs
Lecturer: Prof. Dr. Maria Lehner
- Dozent/in: Maria Lehner