Corporate Finance 101: A Big Picture, Applied Class!

In my last seven posts, I played my version of Moneyball with company data from the end of 2015, looking at how companies invest their shareholders' money, how much they borrow and the determinants of how much cash they return to stockholders. That structure is the one that...

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January 2016 Data Update 7: Dividends, Potential Dividends and Cash Balances

In the last six posts, I have tried to look at the global corporate landscape, starting with how the market is pricing risk in the US and globally, how much investors are getting as risk free returns in different currencies and then moving on to differences across companies...

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January 2016 Data Update 6: Debt, the double edged sword!

In corporate finance, the decision on whether to borrow money, and if so, how much has divided both practitioners and theorists for as long as the question has been debated. Corporate finance, as a discipline, had its beginnings in Merton Miller and Franco Modigliani's classic...

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January 2016 Data Update 5: Making a case for corporate governance

In my last post, I looked at the cost of capital, a measure of what it costs firms to raise capital. That capital, if put to good use by businesses, should earn returns higher than the costs to generate value. Simply put, the end game in business is not just to make money but...

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Chelsea - Accidents Will Happen

After such a successful 2014/15 when they won the Premier League and Capital One Cup, very few people would have expected Chelsea to fall off the rails so spectacularly this season. However, a combination of key players losing form and manager José Mourinho struggling to find...

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