Research Roundtable Discussion: The Diversification Discount

Abstract

Discussants: PHILIP G. BERGER, University of Chicago - Graduate School of Business; ROBERT F. BRUNER, University of Virginia - Darden Graduate School of Business; DAVID J. DENIS, Purdue University - Krannert School of Management; STEPHEN R. FOERSTER, University of Western Ontario - Richard Ivey School of Business; ROBERT H. GERTNER, University of Chicago - Graduate School of Business; STUART C. GILSON, Harvard Business School; JOHN R. GRAHAM, Duke University - Fuqua School of Business; LAURIE SIMON HODRICK, Columbia Business School; STEVEN N. KAPLAN, University of Chicago - Graduate School of Business; LARRY H.P. LANG, Chinese University of Hong Kong; VOJISLAV MAKSIMOVIC, University of Maryland - Robert H. Smith School of Business; JOHN D. MARTIN, Baylor University - Hankamer School of Business; JOHN G. MATSUSAKA, University of Southern California - Marshall School of Business; RANDALL MORCK, University of Alberta School of Business; GORDON M. PHILLIPS, University of Maryland - Robert H. Smith School of Business; HENRI SERVAES, London Business School

Organized by: PETER TUFANO, Harvard Business School

As teachers, we often face the challenge of helping MBA students understand important managerial issues where research is unsettled. This is one of a series of pieces written as a quick introduction to a controversial area which many of us have to touch upon in our courses: the diversification discount. Belen Villalonga has written an overview of some of the issues surrounding the diversification discount and assembled a selected bibliography on the topic. We then invited a small number of leading researchers and teachers in the field to comment on how they treat this topic in the classroom.

JEL Classification: G34