Swiss Institute of Banking and Finance

s/bf-HSG Newsletter May 2012

With this newsletter we would like to inform you about the latest news and developments at the Swiss Institute of Banking and Finance.

News Research Praxis & Politics
Excecutive Education Teaching s/bf in the media
News
Final Lecture by Klaus Spremann
Prof Dr Dr h.c. Klaus Spremann, a pioneer of finance and a supporter of the internationalisation of HSG, will retire in late June 2012. For more than 20 years, Klaus Spremann has been a director of our institute and a co-founder of s/bf in its current form. In recent years, Klaus Spremann deserves great merit for the internationalisation of HSG, specifically in starting our new Singapore location. We thank Klaus Spremann for his extraordinary dedication and the many ways in which he has contributed to research and teaching at our institute and at the University of St. Gallen.
Prof Dr Dr h.c. Klaus Spremann’s final lecture will be held on Tuesday, 8 May 2012, at 6.15 pm in the Audimax auditorium. He will speak (in German) on «Weatherproof portfolios – What investors can do when they expect sudden shifts in conditions, and what consequences these new investment styles will have for corporate finance».

New Director at s/bf: Prof Markus Schmid
We are delighted to welcome Prof Dr Markus Schmid as a new director of our institute. Markus Schmid has taken over the Chair for Corporate Finance on 1 February 2012. Before that, he held a chair at the University of Mannheim. His research interests are corporate finance, corporate governance and financial analysis.

Furthermore, we are happy to welcome two new assistant professors to our team: Prof Dr Marc Arnold (Chair Markus Schmid) and Prof Dr Andreas Käck (Chair Manuel Ammann).

Joint CEPR-UNISG Conference «Finance & The Real Economy»: This conference is co-organized by Prof Martin Brown and Prof Christian Keuschnigg and will bring together researchers in corporate finance, banking and macroeconomics. The conference will take place in St. Gallen on 3rd and 4th September 2012 with Jean-Charles Rochet as the Key-Note speaker.
Research

Selected Working papers: 

Growth Options, Macroeconomic Conditions and the Cross-Section of Credit Risk. M. Arnold, A. F. Wagner & R. Westermann. Working Paper, March 2012. 
The Value of Director Industry Experience. F. von Meyerinck, D. Oesch & M. Schmid, Working Paper, March 2012.
Hedge Fund Liquidity and Performance: Evidence from the Financial Crisis. N. Schaub & M. Schmid, Working Paper, January 2012. 

Publications: 

Is There Really No Conglomerate Discount? M. Ammann, D. Hoechle & M. Schmid, Journal of Business Finance and Accounting, 39(1-2), 2012, 264-288.
Disposition Effect and Mutual Fund Performance. M. Ammann, A. Ising & S. Kessler, Applied Financial Economics, 22(1), 2012, 1-19. 
How Much of the Diversification Discount Can be Explained by Poor Corporate Governance? D. Hoechle, M. Schmid, I. Walter & D. Yermack, Journal of Financial Economics 103(1), 2012, 41-60. 
Geographical Diversification and Firm Value in the Financial Secto. M. Schmid & I. Walter, Journal of Empirical Finance 19(1), 2012, 109-122. 
An Alternative Three-factor Model for International Markets: Evidence from the European Monetary Union. M. Ammann, S. Odoni & D. Oesch, Journal of Banking and Finance (forthcoming).
Hedge Fund Characteristics and Performance Persistence. M. Ammann, O. Huber & M. Schmid, European Financial Management (forthcoming). 
Product Market Competition, Corporate Governance, and Firm Value: Evidence from the EU-Area. M. Schmid, M. Ammann & D. Oesch, European Financial Management (forthcoming).

Received research funds / thirdparty refunds:
SNF Project: Prof Martin Brown and Dr Stefan Morkoetter were awarded a 2-year grant by the Swiss National Science foundation (SNF) for their project «Household-Bank Relationships and Financial Fragility». The project will analyze data from a recently performed representative survey of 1500 Swiss households, which provides information on the bank-relationships maintained by each household and how each household changed these relationships during the financial crisis. 

Praxis & Politics
KFW Development Bank Project:
Prof Dr Martin Brown and Dipl.Vw. Benjamin Guin, together with Prof Dr Karolin Kirschenmann (Aalto University, Helsinki), conduct a study commissioned by KfW Development Bank analysing how households in Southeastern Europe use financial services. Using data from household surveys, the study investigates whether development-focused banks actually have a «development impact» – i.e., whether households whose heads of household are disadvantaged (low-income, employed outside the formal sector, female or ethnic minority) tend to use financial services more if they find themselves close to a development-focused bank. First results indicate that development-focused banks do increase the use of financial services by low-income households and households whose heads are employed outside the formal sector – but not the use of financial services by households whose heads are female or an ethnic minority.
Excecutive Education
«Fit For Finance» will be held again in the autumn 2012.
Fit For Finance is a series of lectures and workshops designed for practioners who want to brush up their financial knowledge. Within the lectures a comprehensive overview of the fundamental concepts of finance and current research is given, while the workshops are designed to implement the newly acquired knowledge.
Teaching
In the Fall Term 2012, two new School of Finance chairs will offer their first lectures for the MBF programme: Prof Roland Füss and Prof Angelo Ranaldo. Prof Füss will mainly strengthen our offering in Real Estate Finance. His class «Real Estate Finance II» as well as his «Research Seminar Real Estate Finance» offer in-depth analysis both theoretically and empirically. Prof Ranaldo strengthens the MBF offering with his classes «Systemic Risk» and «Public Debt Management». After the recent financial crisis, these two classes will be particularly appealing for many students.
s/bf in the media (a selection)

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7.5.2012 

 

 

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Swiss Institute
of Banking and Finance s/bf-HSG
University of St.Gallen
Rosenbergstrasse 52
CH-9000 St.Gallen

 

Ms Beatrix Kobelt
Assistant

Phone: +41 (0)71 224 70 42
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