Advanced Corporate Finance

Course goals

Learning objectives
At the end of the course, the student is able to:

• Understand and discuss various concepts in advanced corporate finance;
• Understand and assess how important theories in finance are empirically tested in the field of corporate finance, and how concepts are measured;
• Discuss and evaluate the contribution of research papers in the context of existing literature;
• Use theoretical insights and/or empirical analyses observed in corporate finance literature to develop new research questions, formulate hypotheses, and undertake analyses on actual financial data 

Content

The course focuses on the latest research in corporate finance. After a brief introduction into the basics of corporate finance, we deepen this knowledge with reading current state-of-the-art contributions in this research area. Topics include law & finance, corporate governance and agency problems, sustainable finance, corporate investments and financing decisions through a behavioural lens, and corporate responses to capital market sentiment.

While providing fundamental theory and evidence in these areas of finance, we will also discuss the strengths and limitations of different empirical research designs/methods underlying the reading materials, including event studies, pooled cross-sectional regression analysis, and surveys. Students work in small groups to apply these techniques on a selection of corporate finance topics and datasets. By doing so, the course demonstrates how research designs and methods that were taught broadly in prior courses of the program (e.g., econometric methods courses in periods 1 and 2) are applied in finance research.

Intended Learning Outcomes
The graduate:

• 1a) has broad knowledge of core and state-of-the-art theories and empirical methods in economics
• 1b) has thorough knowledge of their own research specialization
• 1c) has knowledge of multidisciplinary aspects of their own research specialization
• 2b) can present and communicate in English (communication to experts and non-experts)
• 3b) can summarize and identify common themes in the literature on a specific topic, and keep track of recent developments
• 3c) can critically appraise literature
• 3d) can identify innovative and well-delineated research questions
• 4a) can critically reflect on their own work, and critically reflect on work of others in an appropriate way
• 4i) acquires insight into the process of academic publishing  

Seminars, article discussions, group assignments & presentations, individual final assignment.

In case online access is required for this course and you are not in the position to buy the access code, you are advised to contact the course coordinator for an alternative solution. Please note that access codes are not re-usable meaning that codes from second hand books do not work, as well as access codes from books with a different ISBN. Separate or spare codes are usually not available.