2300 Steinberg-Dietrich Hall
3620 Locust Walk
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Karin S. Thorburn is a Visiting Professor of Finance at the Wharton School at University of Pennsylvania. She is also the Research Chair Professor of Finance at the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH). Prior to joining NHH in 2009, she was a faculty member at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College for 11 years. She is regularly a Visiting Professor and teaches MBA courses at top US business school, including Haas, Wharton, and Tuck. In 2015, she won the master students’ award for teaching excellence at NHH and became a member of Haas’ Club 6.
Thorburn’s research focuses on takeovers, bankruptcy, IPOs, corporate governance, and corporate social responsibility. She regularly publishes in the top academic journals, including Journal of Finance, Journal of Financial Economics, Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Journal of Corporate Finance, and Journal of Environmental Economics and Management.
In 2016, Thorburn serves on a task force appointed by the Norwegian government to assess the equity portion of the $900 billion Government Pension Fund Global. She is a Research Associate of the Center for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) in London, a Research Affiliate of the European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI) in Brussels, a Director of the Executive Committee of the European Finance Association, and Director of the board of Maritime & Merchant Bank ASA and SEB Investment Management AB. She holds a PhD in financial economics from the Stockholm School of Economics.
Thorburn’s research focuses on takeovers, bankruptcy, IPOs, corporate governance, and corporate social responsibility.
Karin Thorburn, B. Espen Eckbo, Tanakorn Makaew (2017), Are stock-financed takeovers opportunistic?, Journal of Financial Economics, forthcoming.
Karin Thorburn, Tore Leite, Einar Bakke (2016), Partial Adjustment to Public Information in the Pricing of IPOs, Journal of Financial Intermediation, forthcoming.
Karin Thorburn, Knut Nygaard, B. Espen Eckbo (Draft), Does gender-balancing the board reduce firm value?.
Karin Thorburn, Wei Wang, B. Espen Eckbo (2016), How costly is corporate bankruptcy for the CEO?, Journal of Financial Economics, 121 (1), pp. 210-229.
Karin Thorburn, B. Espen Eckbo, Rex Thompson, Sandra Betton (2014), Merger negotiations with stock market Feedback, Journal of Finance, 69 (4), pp. 1704-1745.
Karin Thorburn and B. Espen Eckbo (2013), Corporate Restructuring, Foundations and Trends in Finance, 7 (3), pp. 159-288.
Karin Thorburn, B. Espen Eckbo, Xunhua Su (Draft), Penalty-free prepayments, credit rationing and the use of upfront fees in bank loans.
Karin Thorburn and Karen Fisher-Vanden (2011), Voluntary corporate environmental initiatives and shareholder wealth, Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, 62 (3), pp. 430-455.
Karin Thorburn, Sandra Betton, B. Espen Eckbo (2009), Merger negotiations and the Toehold Puzzle, Journal of Financial Economics, 91, pp. 158-178.
Karin Thorburn and B. Espen Eckbo (2009), Automatic bankruptcy auctions and fire-sales, Journal of Financial Economics, 89, pp. 404-422.
The course focuses on financial tools, techniques, and best practices used in buyouts (financial buyers) and acquisitions (strategic buyers). While it will touch upon various strategic, organizational, and general management issues, the main lens for studying these transactions will be a financial one. It will explore how different buyers approach the process of finding, evaluating, and analyzing opportunities in the corporate-control market; how they structure deals and how deal structure affects both value creation and value division; how they add value after transaction completion; and how they realize their ultimate objectives (such as enhanced market position or a profitable exit). The course is divided into two broad modules. The first module covers mergers and acquisitions, and the second one studies buyouts by private equity partnerships. During the spring semester this course cannot be taken pass/fail. FNCE 203 or FNCE 207 may be taken concurrently.
The focus of this course is on buying (or acquiring controlling stakes in) firms. The main topics to be covered are mergers and friendly acquisitions, hostile takeovers and buyouts. Using case studies, the course surveys the drivers of success in the transactions. While issues regarding motive and strategy will be discussed, financial theory would be the main lens used to view these control acquiring transactions. This will allow students to (1) evaluate transactions through valuation approaches and (2) structure deals employing financial innovation as a response to legal framework and economic frictions. This course should be of interest to students interested in pursuing careers as private equity investors, advisors in investment banking and corporate managers that deal with these issues. This course assumes familiarity with valuation analysis. During the spring semester students are not permitted to take this course pass fail. In addition to prerequisites, FNCE 726 or 728 are recommended but not required.