Morgan Stanley Roundtable on Global Private Equity
Steve Kaplan, Carl Ferenbach, Mike Bingle, Phil Canfield, Marc Lipschultz, and Alan Jones

A noted academic authority and a small group of industry practitioners discuss the success of private equity in weathering the recent crisis in light of a track record and core competencies that have established PE as a "permanent asset class."

 An Empirical Model of Optimal Capital Structure
Jules van Binsbergen, John  Graham, and Jie Yang

The authors provide a user-friendly model for arriving at a company's optimal, or value-maximizing, leverage ratio that is based on the estimation of company-specific cost and benefit functions for debt financing. 

The Evolution of Private Equity in Emerging Markets:  The Case of Poland
Darek Klonowski

Economic stabilization, development of the private sector, and continuous improvement of the local institutional infrastructure have contributed to the development of a vibrant private equity industry in Poland, accelerating its transformation into a market economy.  

Financing Shipping Companies and Shipping Operations:
A Risk-Management Perspective
Stefan Albertijn, Wolfgang Bessler, and Wolfgang Drobetz

The financial crisis and changes in the regulatory environment have been forcing shipping companies to reduce their reliance on bank loans and seek capital market financing solutions, including high yield bonds or public equity, as well as use of shipping derivatives to manage risk.

Creating Value at the Intersection of Sourcing, Hedging, and Trading
Blaine Finley and Justin Pettit

To the extent that high prices and increasing price volatility continue to be the rule in  global commodities, the authors suggest that strategic sourcing and hedging of commodities will soon be near the top of the strategic agenda for many companies.

Spin-offs: Tackling the Conglomerate Discount
Ajay Khorana, Anil Shivdasani, Carsten Stendevad, and Sergey Sanzhar

Spin-offs and related restructurings, which rose sharply in 2011, can be an effective tool for addressing the conglomerate valuation discount that has been a pervasive phenomenon in most parts of the world for at least the past decade.

Pre-Issuance Hedging of Fixed-Rate Debt
James Adams and Donald Smith

After analyzing several corporate hedging strategies to manage the interest rate risk on fixed-rate debt prior to issuance, the authors discuss the pros and cons of hedging strategies, with emphasis on practical considerations.

Market Interest in Nonfinancial Information
Robert G. Eccles, George Serafeim, and Michael P. Krzus

The authors provide the first broadly based empirical evidence of investors' interest in information about their environmental, social, and governance (ESG) policies and performance that some companies have voluntarily provided in the past two decades.