Faculty News

Professor Adam Alter explains how fears can be addressed with marketing

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Excerpt from MSNBC -- "Fear is an immediate motivator and I think it's therefore an especially powerful tool in marketing for good and for bad...One of the big keys is if people are feeling fearful that you also give them a tool or tools to deal with that fear and you give them a sense of control...so they actually manage the fear and overcome it. Even if the chance of something bad happening is small, we want to know that it's something we don't have to worry about."
Faculty News

Profs. Philippon and Savov's research on efficiency in financial markets is highlighted

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Excerpt from Business Insider -- "More information is not necessarily better information. That's the conclusion from an October 2012 New York Federal Reserve study flagged Sunday by Chris Dixon. In 'Have Financial Markets Become More Informative?', Jennie Bai, Thomas Philippon, and Alexi Savov argue that over the past 50 years, markets have not grown more efficient about how to allocate capital, at least via stocks."
Faculty News

Prof. Scott Galloway on how Kenneth Cole's statements on social media have impacted his brand

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Excerpt from CNN -- "The fact that we're here right now is probably evidence that this is a victory for Kenneth Cole. Whether or not this is offensive or across the line is a topic of debate. But to a certain extent, this is a victory that has caused attention and Kenneth Cole is now a big part of today's media lineup. And I think at the end of the day, I think that's a victory for him and the brand."
Faculty News

Prof. Aswath Damodaran explains why he believes Tesla is overvalued at its current market price

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Excerpt from CNBC -- "On Tesla itself, I think there's been a lot of good news about the company, but it's still a small company. 1.3 billion in revenues. It's losing money. And even with an optimistic view of the future, if you think of it as an automobile company, I find it difficult to get to the $20 billion that you get as a market cap for the company right now. If you allow the revenues to go from where they are now to Audi levels, $65 billion, and the margins to improve to Porsche level margins, they are among the highest in the auto sector, you still end up with a value of about $8 billion, $9 billion, $10 billion for the company. If you want to stretch to $20 billion, you've got to give me a really good narrative as to what's going to be different about the future for this company."
Faculty News

Prof. Nouriel Roubini on upcoming stress tests by the European Central Bank

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Excerpt from The Wall Street Journal -- "The European Central Bank will be 'tough' in the upcoming asset quality review and stress tests of the European banking sector, New York University professor Nouriel Roubini said Friday. 'I think they will be tough as they want to build a reputation' ahead of taking over the supervision of larger European banks, Mr. Roubini told reporters at a conference here. He added that he thinks the ECB's reviews will find that several Italian banks are undecapitalized, including some of the largest of the country."
Faculty News

Prof. Nouriel Roubini shares his thoughts on US economic growth

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Excerpt from Bloomberg TV -- "There is an economic recovery but in my view it's very fragile. GDP growth in the third quarter might be barely 2%. In the second quarter, excluding inventories, it was less than 2%. There is an improvement in the labor market, but in part it's due to a fall in the labor force participation rate."
Faculty News

Dean Peter Henry will headline the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica's Economic Forum

Excerpt from the Jamaica Observer -- "Henry is the Dean of New York University's Stern School of Business and also a former Professor of International Economics at Stanford University. He is the author of the thought-provoking book Turn-Around: Third World Lessons for First World Growth, in which he posits that the secret to emerging countries' success is discipline -- sustained commitment to a pragmatic growth strategy. ... At the forum, Henry will share his thoughts on how the policy pendulum now swings toward prudence and self-control in much of the emerging world."
Faculty News

Prof. Edward Altman on rising corporate debt and his recent Z-score forecasts

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Excerpt from The Wall Street Journal -- "'Many companies are repeating some of the mistakes of the past,' by taking on too much debt, said Edward Altman, a New York University business school professor and the creator of a well-known tool for measuring corporate health, called the Z-score. Mr. Altman said his latest forecast, which measures the probability of corporate defaults, showed overall corporate health was 'no better than it was in 2007 and by some measures worse.' The median scores, which measure corporate financial health by analyzing a combination of liquidity, earnings, solvency and stock market valuations, were 4% lower for companies rated 'junk' in 2012 than in 2007."
Faculty News

Prof. Justin Kruger's research on the "above average effect" is cited

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Excerpt from The Globe and Mail -- "A study some years ago by David Dunning and Justin Kruger found that most people, regardless of their level of competence with a skill, perceive themselves to be better than average. And it gets worse. This concept doesn’t include those people who boast about their impressive writing skills but are in fact downright terrible writers. These folks may be suffering from 'Dunning-Kruger effect.' The same study found those who are the least skilled tend to rate their abilities higher than others. The worse they were the better they thought they were."
Faculty News

In an op-ed, Prof. Jonathan Haidt discusses competition within Sears's business model

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Excerpt from Forbes -- "Evolution is all about competition, and the dramatic effects that competition has on the structure and behavior of organisms over time. But here’s the key idea: competition occurs at multiple levels simultaneously, and the winner at any one level generally succeeds by suppressing destructive forms of competition at the level below."
Faculty News

Prof. Scott Galloway on fashion brands' use of social media and fashion week

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Excerpt from Marketplace -- "The traditional runway show may not be cost effective for many designers who can’t afford not to turn it into a branding event, according Scott Galloway, a marketing professor at NYU’s Stern School of Business. 'I think brands have realized that and are trying to figure out a way to spread some of that fabulous across their customer base via social media,' Galloway says."
Faculty News

Prof. Aswath Damodaran finds that Tesla's fair market value is 40% of its current market price

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Excerpt from The Wall Street Journal -- “'You can accuse me of being too pessimistic in my assumptions, but the narrative that underlies my valuation is an optimistic one,' Mr. Damodaran said in a blog post summarizing his findings. 'I am assuming that Tesla will grow to be as large as Audi, while delivering operating margins closer to Porsche’s. Even with these assumptions, I cannot see a rationale for buying the company at today’s market price, but that is just my personal judgment.'”
Faculty News

Prof. Viral Acharya is interviewed on new Reserve Bank of India Governor Raghuram Rajan

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Excerpt from Economic Times -- "Raghuram Rajan is first and foremost a sharp observer of economies. Raghu's interests and understanding of global finance extend beyond his immediate research focus, which is on banking and corporate finance. In particular, Raghu has always been interested in the growth of economies and the institutional and political features governing law and policymaking that lead to or preclude such growth. What is perhaps Raghu's forte is connecting dots in a manner that reflects unusual depth and common sense."
Faculty News

Prof. Edward Altman is interviewed about his Z-score research

Excerpt from Treasury & Risk -- “'It’s my experience that failure prediction models have done fairly poorly when it comes to financial institutions,' Altman said. 'It always seems that the latest banking crisis is caused by something fairly unique to the current situation and not necessarily correlated with prior bank crises.'”
Faculty News

Prof. Lawrence White on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

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Excerpt from TheStreet.com -- "'The possibility of truly privatizing them isn't there,' says Lawrence White, professor of economics at NYU's Stern School of Business and author of Guaranteed to Fail: Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Debacle of Mortgage Finance. Fannie and Freddie were once credible institutions with great human capital but all of that has gone now, he says. That ship has sailed. The blow to their reputations has been too great for either [agency] to exist as their former selves."
Faculty News

Prof. Luke Williams evaluates startups as a panelist on CNBC's Power Pitch

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Excerpt from CNBC -- "...Power Pitch panelist Luke Williams, Executive Director of the Berkley Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation at NYU Stern Business School, was concerned about the startup's competition. 'I'm not sure if this is an app that other people can easily do...I'm not sure if the system that's behind this is actually making it all work and making it differentiate on the market.'"
Faculty News

Prof. Yakov Amihud weighs in on the impact of religious holidays on the stock market

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Excerpt from The Wall Street Journal -- "Yakov Amihud, a finance professor at New York University’s Stern School of Business, says, 'When market liquidity is expected to be lower than normal, expected return should be higher than normal. This may apply for Rosh Hashana.'”
Faculty News

In an op-ed, Prof. Viral Acharya discusses the health of India's banks

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Exerpt from LiveMint -- "At the V-Lab in New York University’s Stern Business School, we estimate the capital needs of banks in future stress. We use market data to assess the downside risk of banks and assess their gearing in a stress scenario by comparing their book liabilities to market value of equity after taking account of the downside risk. Our estimates suggest that in the event of a minus 40% correction to the global market over a six-month period, as seen in the Great Depression and the Great Recession, publicly traded Indian banks and financial firms will require over $80 billion of equity capital to maintain a market equity ratio of 8% relative to their assets."
Faculty News

Prof. Scott Galloway on the outlook for new smartphones

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Excerpt from Bloomberg TV -- "The thing I’m watching for, or I think the most interesting event is Apple’s launch of a discount phone – the 5C. They’ve effectively been relegated to the high-end market. Apple became the largest market cap company on the backs of one unbelievable phenomena. They became the low-cost producer at the premium price; the biggest market share, lowest price. That would be like if Ferrari had the market share of Toyota – that’s a very powerful cocktail…"
Faculty News

Prof. Scott Galloway discusses Microsoft's place in the smartphone market

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Excerpt from Bloomberg TV -- "They registered pretty substantial market share gains, Microsoft Windows phones this quarter. That's the good news. The bad news is the number 4. That's their market share. So it's 80 - 14 - 4. Android, iOS and then Microsoft Windows-powered phones. But they do have a foothold in the market now."
Faculty News

In an op-ed, Prof. Hershfield explains how emphasizing our history boosts environmentalism

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Excerpt from The Huffington Post -- "In a paper to be published in Psychological Science, we propose that another way to influence people's behavior towards protecting the environment is to emphasize the long life expectancy of a nation, rather than its imminent downfall. ... If people perceive their country or planet's remaining time to be very short, then they rationally shouldn't place too much importance on making these present-day sacrifices. But if a long future is seen, sacrifices today for a brighter tomorrow for ourselves and our offspring make more sense."
Faculty News

Prof. Arun Sundararajan on the emergence of the sharing economy

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Excerpt from the LA Times -- "'This is the first stage of something more profound, which is the ability of people to structure their lives around doing multiple sharing-economy activities as a choice in lieu of a 9-to-5, five-day-a-week job,' said Arun Sundararajan, a professor at New York University. 'This is technology-driven progress,' he said. 'This is what it's all about.'"
Faculty News

In an op-ed, Prof. Viral Acharya weighs the impact of investor sentiment in India

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Excerpt from Livemint -- "What should perhaps come as a surprise is that until recently, the investor view and pricing of India’s currency and markets hardly seemed to reflect the ground reality. The expansion of monetary base due to unconventional central bank policies in the Western economies, especially in the US, found its way readily into the Indian debt and equity markets. These flows, however, abruptly reversed themselves since the announcement in May of the potential tapering of the US Federal Reserve’s expansionary policies. The sentiment on India has since turned bearish, its asset and currency markets have suffered quick and massive depreciations, and its structural weaknesses for generating future growth have all of a sudden come to the fore."
Faculty News

Prof. Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh on foreign investors buying real estate in New York

Excerpt from Details -- "'If you're a Brazilian billionaire, moving money offshore into a Manhattan apartment is a good idea,' says Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh, the director of the Center for Real Estate Finance Research at NYU Stern School of Business. 'The market hasn't peaked yet. It's a stable currency. And these foreign investors aren't looking for a 5-to-7-percent return on their investment. It's a trophy asset, a luxury good.'"
Faculty News

Prof. Al Lieberman shares dos and don'ts for job and internship interviews

Excerpt from Advertising Week -- "Pick a company and a business superstar that resonate with you. It's like becoming a loyal fan of a rock star. Create a virtual shadow of these entities and learn everything you can so you will be ready when it's time to be introduced."