Phillip Braun
Phillip Braun

FINANCE
Clinical Professor of Finance

Print Overview
Professor Phillip A. Braun specializes in the study of emerging market economies and financial markets. He is the author of a number of articles, most recently a series of papers studying the emerging Islamic economies.

Prof. Braun joined the Kellogg School of Management as a Visiting Professor of Finance after spending two years across town at the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago and 10 years working and teaching in Asia. Most recently Professor Braun was a Senior Member of the Policy Advisor Group to the Prime Minister’s office in Thailand, as well as, an Executive Director of the Booker Group, a publicly traded Investment Bank in Thailand and a Professor of Finance at the Sasin Graduate School of Business of Chulalongkorn University. Prior to this he was a Managing Director of Corporate Finance at CLSA Emerging Markets, specializing in Financial Advisory work throughout Asia.

Prior to moving to Asia is when Prof Braun was on the Finance Faculty at Kellogg School of Management as an Assistant Professor. Prof Braun was rated by BusinessWeek as one of the Top Finance Professors in the United States when he was at Kellogg at that time, when the students selected him as the Teacher of the year.

He is the recipient of several academic awards, including the Merrill Lynch Capital Markets Research Professorship for Outstanding Research and the First Chicago Bank Research Professorship. His PhD dissertation was a runner-up for the Zellner Prize given by the American Statistical Association.

Braun earned a bachelor's degree in economics with honors from Oberlin College in 1981. He received a master's degree in economics with honors from Washington University in St. Louis in 1986 and a PhD in business, specializing in finance and economics at the GSB in 1993.

Selected Publications With Dan Nelson and Alain Sunier, "Good News, Bad News, Volatility, and Betas," Journal of Finance (1995). With George Constantinides and Wayne Ferson, "Time Nonseparability in Aggregate Consumption: International Evidence," European Economic Review (1993). With Stefan Mittnik, "Misspecifications in Vector Autoregressions and their Effects on Impulse Responses and Variance Decomposition's," Journal of Econometrics (1993). With Victor Zarnowitz, "Twenty-two Years of the NBER-ASA Quarterly Economic Outlook Surveys: Aspects and Comparisons of Forecasting Performance," Business Cycles, Indicators, and Forecasting, James Stock and Mark Watson, eds., University of Chicago Press (1993). With Ilan Yaniv, "A Case Study of Expert Judgment: Economists' Probabilities Versus Base-Rate Model Forecasts," Journal of Behavioral Decision Making (1992).
Print Vita
Education
PhD, 1993, Business, Finance and Economics, Graduate School of Business, University of Chicago
MA, 1986, Economics, Washington University in St. Louis, with Honors
BA, 1981, Economics, Oberlin College, with Honors

 
Print Research

 
Print Teaching
Full-Time / Part-Time MBA
Finance I (FINC-430-0)

This course counts toward the following majors: Analytical Finance, Finance

This course studies the effects of time and uncertainty on decision making. Topics include discounted cash flow valuation, stock and bond valuation, the term structure of interest rates, bond duration, capital budgeting under certainty and uncertainty, portfolio theory, asset pricing models and efficient markets.

The prerequisite for this course is knowledge of probability and statistics through linear regression. This requirement may be satisfied with either (i) prior or concurrent registration in Decision Sciences 434, (ii) sufficient previous course work in statistics. Familiarity with basic financial accounting (Accounting 430) and microeconomics (Managerial Economics 430) is recommended.

To qualify for a Finance I (FINC-430) waiver, you must have passed a comparable course with a grade of A. The type and level of material covered in the course are represented by chapters 1-13 and 23 of the text by Brealey and Myers, Principles of Corporate Finance. You need not request a Finance I waiver to enroll in FINC-440 (Turbo). To help you decide whether you should waive Finance I, take the self-assessment test online at www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/finance/curriculum/finance1waiver.htm.

Finance I/II (FINC-440-0)

This course counts toward the following majors: Analytical Finance, Finance

This course combines the materials of FINC-430 and FINC-441 into an intensive one-quarter course available to One-Year students and first-year students interested in accelerating their studies of finance. Students choosing this option should expect the presentations, readings and other homework to be at least double those of the regular courses. By combining these two courses into one quarter, students are able to take more advanced finance electives during their first year and have the opportunity to include an extra finance elective in their course schedules. Please note that this course carries the weight of one course only. Prerequisites: Knowledge of (a) probability and statistics through linear regression and (b) financial accounting. Requirement (a) may be satisfied with prior or concurrent registration in DECS 434, sufficient previous course work in statistics. Requirement (b) may be satisfied with prior or concurrent registration in ACCT 430 or sufficient previous course work in financial accounting. MECN 430 is recommended.

Finance II (FINC-441-0)

This course counts toward the following majors: Analytical Finance, Finance.

This course is the sequel to FINC-430. The primary objective is to examine the financial decisions of firms with regard to their capital budgeting decisions (which investments to make), dividend decisions and capital structure decisions (how to raise capital). We first examine these decisions in an idealized frictionless world in which the firm cannot change its value by altering its dividend or capital structure policy. We then explore the effect of frictions (e.g. taxes, bankruptcy costs, inefficient or uncompetitive financial markets, or self-interested managers) on the firm's financial decisions and how these decisions can affect a firm's value. Prerequisites: FINC-430. Corequisite: DECS-434 or equivalent. ACCT-430 and MECN-430 are recommended.

Asset Management Practicum II (FINC-934-0)

This course counts toward the following majors: Finance

Students enrolled in this sequence of courses will manage a portion of the Kellogg School’s endowment. The courses will combine investment theory with exposure to leading practitioners. Students will rotate across roles of industry analysts, hedge fund fund-of-funds managers, traders, quantitative analysts, and portfolio managers. Note: This course may not be dropped after the first week of the quarter. Students must take the entire sequence, FINC 933, 934 and 935.

Co-requisites: Over the three-quarter sequence students must take four quarter credits in additional asset management-related courses from the following list:

FINC-442-0 Financial Decisions

FINC-444-0 Advanced Topics in Finance

FINC-447-0 Financial Strategy and Tax Planning

FINC-451-0 Money Markets and the Fed

FINC-460-0 Investments

FINC-462-0 Portfolio Management

FINC-463-0 Security Analysis

FINC-464-0 Fixed Income Securities

FINC-465-0 Derivative Markets I

FINC-467-0 Derivative Markets II

FINC-936-0 Asset Management Practicum IV

FINC-941-0 Macroeconomic Policy and Global Capital Markets

FINC-970-0 Empirical Methods in Finance

ACCT-451-0 Financial Reporting and Analysis

ACCT-452-0 Financial Reporting and Analysis II



Asset Management Practicum III (FINC-935-0)

This course counts toward the following majors: Finance

Students enrolled in this sequence of courses will manage a portion of the Kellogg School’s endowment. The courses will combine investment theory with exposure to leading practitioners. Students will rotate across roles of industry analysts, hedge fund fund-of-funds managers, traders, quantitative analysts, and portfolio managers. Students must take the entire sequence, FINC 933, 934, and 935.Note: This course may not be dropped after the first week of the quarter.

Co-requisites: Over the three-quarter sequence students must take four quarter credits in additional asset management-related courses from the following list:

FINC-442-0 Financial Decisions

FINC-444-0 Advanced Topics in Finance

FINC-447-0 Financial Strategy and Tax Planning

FINC-451-0 Money Markets and the Fed

FINC-460-0 Investments

FINC-462-0 Portfolio Management

FINC-463-0 Security Analysis

FINC-464-0 Fixed Income Securities

FINC-465-0 Derivative Markets I

FINC-467-0 Derivative Markets II

FINC-936-0 Asset Management Practicum IV

FINC-941-0 Macroeconomic Policy and Global Capital Markets

FINC-970-0 Empirical Methods in Finance

ACCT-451-0 Financial Reporting and Analysis

ACCT-452-0 Financial Reporting and Analysis II