Fall 2015 Syllabus.pdf

10 West 35th Street Chicago, Illinois 60616-3793

Phone 312.906.6500

Illinois Institute of Technology Stuart School of Business

Course Syllabus Fall 2015

Instructor Information Name: John J. Szobocsan Office: DTC Telephone: 312 543 – 7841 Fax: 312 222 -‐ 0008 Email: [email protected] Office hours: Office hours are flexible and at the request of the student TA Information: N/A

Course Information Course #: MSF 535 – 01 Course name: Investment Banking Course description: MSF 535 - 01: Investment Banking provides the advanced

corporate finance graduate student with an understanding of the transactional and advisory side of investment banking, private equity and venture capital. Numerous valuation techniques including comparative, transactional, and discounted cash flow methods form the core of the course, building on the student’s understanding of concepts in corporate finance, financial statement analysis, and business law. In MSF 535 - 01, other topics covered will include “going to market” and mergers and acquisitions. MSF 535 - 01 will not cover topics directly related to sales and trading side of the investment bank as many of these topics are covered in other coursework at Stuart.

MSF 535 - 01 consists of three separate but integrated modules starting with required course readings from the designated textbook to class lectures to homework assignments. The readings from the required textbook provide the student with the mechanics of the valuation process and the textbook authors provide Microsoft Excel spreadsheets to assist the student with


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the mechanized steps of valuation. These spreadsheets are downloadable from the authors’ website hosted by the publisher.

The class lectures are designed to provide the student with real world examples and experiences beyond the simple computational tools developed in the textbook. As a result, the lectures complement but do not necessarily repetitively cover the information in the assigned readings. It is the student’s responsibility to masterfully demonstrate knowledge of material covered in both the required course textbook and the topics covered during the course lecture. The instructor will provide a brief synopsis of the material covered in the lecture afterwards on Blackboard. Reading assignments may occasionally be assigned in addition to the required course textbook readings.

The homework assignments and examinations are designed to probe the student’s understanding of the material covered. These assignments may rely on material covered directly in the course readings, lectures, or indirectly on material covered in the course prerequisites. The homework assignments are individual work product and any use of reference material must be properly documented on the assignment.

Course day and time: Tuesdays: 6:00 PM – 8:30 PM Course Objectives: The objective of the course is to develop knowledge on the

transactional and advisory side of investment banking, private equity and venture capital.

Pre-‐requisites: MSF 534: Corporate Finance. The student must also possess a

working knowledge of financial statement analysis coupled with a basic understanding of U.S. GAAP and U.S. tax code.

Required Course Materials Text: Investment Banking: Valuation, Leveraged Buyouts and Mergers & Acquisitions, Joshua Rosenbaum and Joshua Pearl, Second Edition, Wiley & Sons, Finance Series, 2013.


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Materials: N/A Software: MS-‐Excel Programming Skills: N/A Text References: N/A

Recommended Course Materials Supplemental texts/readings: Supplemental reading assignments are made

periodically throughout the semester and are based on articles on corporate finance found on financial news websites.

Software: N/A Some other good books: Contemporaneous book recommendations are made

throughout the semester and are determined by the current deal flow/transactional events.

Text References: N/A

Course & Instructor Policies

Make-‐up: Make-‐up assignments are determined on a case-‐by-‐case basis; however, all

assignments are posted one week before due date. There is no make-‐up for the mid-‐term or the final exam.

Late work: Late work will be penalized one percentage point for each day the assignment

is submitted after the due date. Special assignments: N/A Class attendance: Class attendance is mandatory. If the student is unable to attend a class,

the student must contact the instructor by email prior to the start of class.

Classroom conduct: Students are expected to be courteous and to refrain from texting and

surfing the web. Students are also expected to participate in class discussions.

Discipline: See above

Grading System/Policy

Percentages for assignments: Class Exercises/Participation 10% Homework (6 assignments) 40% Class Project 20% Final 30% Grade scale: 100 – 90 (A); 89 – 80 (B); 79 – 70 (C) Incompletes: All incompletes must be addressed by the end of the following semester.

Class Participation: Grading for class participation is determined by the student (i) attending every class scheduled; (ii) actively participating with course dialogue; and (iii) demonstrating sufficient mastery of subject matter when called upon to answer questions. The grade for class participation is determined by the instructor. If the student is unable to attend a class, the student must contact the instructor by email prior to the start of class. Assignments: Six individual work product assignments will be distributed during the term to measure the individual student’s mastery of the subject material. Each assignment will be a maximum of one or two pages in length, as specified for that assignment and use of a one-and-one-half line spacing standard. The student’s name, student identification number, student email address, and assignment number must be present at the top left corner of every assignment. The student must email the instructor the assignment by the assignment due date and before the start of class. That email address is found on each and every assignment posted to Blackboard. If, for any reason, the student is unable to complete the assignment by the assignment due date the student must contact the instructor by email at least one day before the assignment due date. The student is also responsible for making sure that the instructor has received the assignment on by the due date and time. Project: A group project will be assigned midway through the term. The student will be required to work on some components of the Project independently and work on the remainder with other classmates. The groups will be assigned by the instructor to mimic work experience common within the industry. Your grade for the assignment is conditional on the grading provided by your group team members and by the instructor for the overall group project. Final Examination: A final examination will take place at the conclusion of the term to ascertain an understanding of skills and knowledge developed during the term. The examination is due at the assigned date and no extensions will be made available. If for any reason, the student cannot complete the final examination by the due date, the student will receive an incomplete for the term until another final examination is taken. Grading: The instructor is the only arbiter of final grade assignments for MSF 535 - 01 based on the work product submitted and class participation by the student on the tasks outlined above. The distribution of final grades is made at the sole discretion of the instructor but will consider individual and overall class performance throughout the term.

Disabilities

Reasonable accommodations will be made for students with documented disabilities. In order to receive accommodations, students must obtain a letter of accommodation from the Center for Disability Resources. The Center for Disability Resources (CDR) is located in 3424 S. State St., room 1C3-‐2 (on the first floor), telephone 312 567.5744 or [email protected].

Copyright/Plagiarism/Academic Integrity

Rules on Plagiarism and Academic Integrity Plagiarism and other violations of academic integrity are strictly prohibited and subject to penalty as defined by the University. Information about the IIT academic requirements for graduate students can be found at: http://www.iit.edu/graduate_college/pdfs/Graduate_Student_Handbook.pdf The academic integrity material in the handbook is found at page 31 in the IIT student handbook. Other parts of the handbook also contain material and rules that apply to graduate students. Students will be expected to conform to the rules and procedures set forth in the handbook.

The code of conduct governing writing by students at IIT requires original writing, prohibits plagiarism and provides severe sanctions for plagiarism. Original writing consists of thinking through ideas and expressing them in your own way. If the ideas are from other sources, use footnotes or other citation methods to indicate the source of the ideas. Plagiarism is the act of passing off someone else’s work or ideas as your own. The sanctions include, but are not limited to, expulsion and the imposition of a punitive grade of ‘E’.

What is Plagiarism?

Often there is some confusion as to what constitutes plagiarism. Plagiarism is the act of passing off someone else’s work as your own. To assist in providing an understanding of the types of writing that constitute plagiarism, three types of are each discussed below. Also discussed below is the problem of “string citations.” String citations are not plagiarism, but many professors will reject string citations because they are not the student’s original work.

Word for Word copying: The use of any phrase or excerpt from another source requires the use of quotation marks around the copied material, or if the material is more than a few lines, the copied material should be placed in its own indented paragraph. A citation in proper form is always required to identify the source.

Plagiarizing by Paraphrase: When a writer uses a source, substitutes words and sentences, or even changes the order but keeps the meaning of the original, a citation is required. In the example given below, the original is on the left. The paraphrase in the right box constitutes plagiarism.

Original: It is not generally recognized that at the same time when women are making their way into every corner of our work-‐world, only one percent of the professional engineers in the nation are female. A generation ago, this statistic would have raised no eyebrows, but today, it is hard to believe.

Paraphrase: Few people realize now that women are finding jobs in all fields, that a tiny percentage of the country’s engineers are female. Years ago this would have surprised no one, but now it seems incredible.

The writer could avoid plagiarism here by acknowledging the source and providing a proper citation.

Mosaic Plagiarism: Here the writer lifts phrases and terms from the source and embeds them in his own prose. An example follows in which the lifted phrases are underlined:

The pressure is on to get more women into engineering. The engineering schools and major corporations have opened wide their gates and are recruiting women zealously. Practically all women engineering graduates can find attractive jobs. Nevertheless, at the moment, only one percent of the professional engineers in the country are female.

Mosaic plagiarism is sometimes caused by careless note taking. However, it looks dishonest and is judged as such. The use of quotation marks around the original wording and citation avoid the problem of plagiarism. Often a better approach is to use paraphrase or to quote directly (with appropriate citations).

Plagiarism can be avoided by providing citations for the sources of any material, including ideas, phrases, or sentences that you have used in your paper. A number of different systems are available for providing citations. The key to all of them is that the writer must clearly identify for the reader the sources of all material (including ideas) that have come from somewhere else.

String Quotation Problem: Sometimes a student will write a paper consisting of a string of quotations. It is usually much better for a student to provide his or her own analysis and write the paper in his or her own words. Many professors will reject a paper consisting primarily of material quoted from other sources because they do not view such a paper as the student’s own work. You should understand your professor's view with respect to string quotations prior to writing your paper.

Academic/Class Calendar & Assignments Topics Covered: I. Review of Theories, Concepts and New Developments in Corporate Finance II. Valuation Methods of the Firm a. Comparative b. Transactional c. Discounted Cash Flow d. Privately-Held Entities III. Leveraged Buy-Out Analysis IV. Mergers & Acquisitions V. Going to Market (Issuing Publicly-Traded Equity) a. Initial Public Offerings b. Reverse Mergers c. Secondary Equity Offering VI. Topics on Private Equity and Venture Capital Reading Assignments: Reading assignments from the course textbook are assigned

one week before the topic above is covered. Homework: Six homework assignments are assigned, approximately every

other week during the semester. Due Dates: Assignments are due one week after assignment. Exam Dates: The final exam is assigned two weeks before the end of the

semester and due on the 16th week. The project report is due on the 15th week with the project presentation due on the 16th week.

Withdrawal dates: The course withdrawal date is the standard date set by

IIT/Stuart.

Fall 2015 Syllabus.pdf

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Transcript of Fall 2015 Syllabus.pdf