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In April 1930, US Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon reviewed recent stock market events as he prepared to enter a meeting of the Federal Reserve Board, which he chaired. In September and October 1929, the US stock market had fallen about a third, and then recovered somewhat. In response to the turmoil, the Federal Reserve (Fed) had lowered the discount rate in five steps from 6% to 3.71%, and market rates of interest across a range of debt securities had followed. Now, given the recovery in the stock market, Mellon wondered what further guidance to give to the Fed, and what actions to recommend to the president and to Congress. What were the lessons of the recent market turmoil? What policies should the Fed pursue? Answers to such questions depended on agreement about the issues to be resolved. Advice streamed in from business, politicians, the press, and pundits of all kinds, and hinged on interpretations of the recent turmoil, which ranged from a standard cyclical correction to an international crisis. This case presents the events leading up to the Great Depression and explores a range of responses and interpretations by participants, contemporary observers, and scholars of economics and history.

This note explores the technology and economics of emerging 5G networks.

An unlikely but highly effective leader of a traditional bank, Rakefet Russak-Aminoach, simultaneously leads a classic change effort and an unconventional effort to innovate.

Synthetic biology start-up C16 Biosciences wants to solve a big problem: replace palm oil, a major contributor to deforestation and climate change, with a lab-grown substitute. CEO Shara Ticku has ambitious plans to supply her lab-grown palm oil to food manufacturers, who use palm oil liberally in a variety of products from ice cream to margarine. In bringing her product to market, Ticku faces a tough decision. Should she roll out the product first in the personal care market, which has lower volumes and premium prices, or go straight for food? The meteoric rise of lab-grown meat company Impossible Foods has caught the attention of an investor, who wonders if C16 should tap into excitement about lab-grown foods to raise a Series A funding round. But are there merits to starting small?

This two-part case series (A and B) puts students into the role of Juan Perez, an investment analyst who works for Suprabanco, a fictional multilateral lending institution headquartered in Bogotá, Colombia. The case opens in 2018, when a risk assessment determined that Venezuela might struggle to repay a Suprabanco loan because it was denominated in US dollars. At the same time, the bank wondered if cryptocurrencies had the potential to increase returns and diversify a portfolio. So, Suprabanco assigned Perez two tasks: 1) Investigate the viability of increasing returns by adding cryptocurrencies to a portfolio of investments and, 2) Determine if cryptocurrencies could be an alternative to the US dollar in case the Venezuelan loan situation deteriorated. Case (A) examines cryptocurrencies in general and focuses specifically on bitcoin, including its origins, requirements (technology, community, and liquidity), regulatory environment, and competitors. Case (B) examines the Venezuelan Petro, a sovereign-issued cryptocurrency designed to overcome hyperinflation and US sanctions that locked the country out of international financial markets. Both cases describe decisions facing Perez as an investment analyst and introduce the reader to cryptocurrency opportunities and challenges, blockchain technology, and ethical dilemmas.

This two-part case series (A and B) puts students into the role of Juan Perez, an investment analyst who works for Suprabanco, a fictional multilateral lending institution headquartered in Bogotá, Colombia. The case opens in 2018, when a risk assessment determined that Venezuela might struggle to repay a Suprabanco loan because it was denominated in US dollars. At the same time, the bank wondered if cryptocurrencies had the potential to increase returns and diversify a portfolio. So, Suprabanco assigned Perez two tasks: 1) Investigate the viability of increasing returns by adding cryptocurrencies to a portfolio of investments and, 2) Determine if cryptocurrencies could be an alternative to the US dollar in case the Venezuelan loan situation deteriorated. Case (A) examines cryptocurrencies in general and focuses specifically on bitcoin, including its origins, requirements (technology, community, and liquidity), regulatory environment, and competitors. Case (B) examines the Venezuelan Petro, a sovereign-issued cryptocurrency designed to overcome hyperinflation and US sanctions that locked the country out of international financial markets. Both cases describe decisions facing Perez as an investment analyst and introduce the reader to cryptocurrency opportunities and challenges, blockchain technology, and ethical dilemmas.

In 2015, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) moved from target-driven sales, to a no-sales target regime. This change involved the sales incentives plan and performance measurement parameters of the front line medical sales force of the company. The executive director of Human Resources knew that challenges lay ahead in managing the company's employees and reinvigorating the values of the organization. He was hoping to shift the focus of the sales force to ethical behaviour, dissemination of scientific knowledge among doctors, and customer and patient care. Many people were adapting to the new system while a few resisted, and some left the organization. Though management anticipated this turn of events and accepted the employee turnover, the director knew that more work needed to be done to make the new system more acceptable and functional. How should he address the subjectivity of the system, simplify it for his salesforce, and address the concerns of his managers? Would the new system motivate performance? Could he convince his employees of the potential benefits of the process- and competence-based pay system at GSK?

Student spreadsheet to case W19580

In January 2019, the telecommunications industry was under severe threat of disruption. Telecommunications companies (telcos), which had historically been able to cope with technological disruption by moving from first-generation through to fifth-generation cellular network technologies, were now threatened by digital service providers (DSPs)-firms that came with a new business model that threatened the telcos' existing business models. Telcos were being forced to deliver only network connectivity, whereas DSPs had positioned themselves to deliver the more lucrative digital services directly to customers. The Norwegian telco Telenor Group (Telenor) decided to take up this battle by offering digital services to end-customers. However, doing so raised several important questions: Was full confrontation with large DSPs inevitable, or was there another way? How could Telenor switch from the old to the new business model? Was it possible to manage two conflicting business models under the same company?

Between 2016 and 2019, the India-based budget hotel start-up Oravel Stays Private Limited (OYO) expanded into nine countries, including the United Kingdom and the United States. However, OYO faced several crises in its home country: contracted hoteliers of OYO threatened to file lawsuits against the start-up for breach of contract, and customers raised service quality issues. Critics believed that with such rapid internationalization, OYO's founder was simply burning through the cash of venture capitalists. Nevertheless, the founder was determined to expand internationally while enhancing OYO's service portfolio in India. Should he reconsider his decision to focus on international markets instead of the domestic market? Could legal issues in OYO's home country create impediments to this growth plan? How should he deal with these issues?

Options trading is an appealing investment alternative that can enable investors to profit from both share price movements and non-volatile market environments. This note provides a guide for entry-level options traders and is a logical progression from An Introduction to the Pricing of Options (905N14). The note reviews characteristics of options and the factors affecting their valuation, and it outlines several trading mechanisms that new options traders might use as they seek their most effective strategies, including long call, short put, bull call spread, short call, long put, bear put spread, short straddle, short strangle, long butterfly, long straddle, and long strangle.

"Barcelona backs out of proposed LaLiga match in Miami." It is December 2018, and Daniel Sillman, chief executive officer of sports and entertainment company Relevent, is tasked with finding a way forward after a significant setback. Relevent had found success by convincing some of Europe's highest-profile soccer clubs to play pre-season matches in North America as part of its annual International Champions Cup (ICC), held during the summer months. Building on that success, Relevent is now seeking to bring at least one official LaLiga match to the U.S, each season-an effort that is a key pillar of Relevent's new, fifteen-year partnership with the Spanish soccer league, aimed at promoting the LaLiga brand in North America. However, the match that Relevent had selected to take place in Miami in January 2019, between FC Barcelona and Girona FC, had become a source of tension, drawing protests from the Spanish football federation, the Spanish players' association, and the president of worldwide governing body FIFA. Today, FC Barcelona's leadership team had announced the club would withdraw. Would Relevent find success in bringing a LaLiga match to the U.S.? And, more generally, did Relevent have the right approach to growing the LaLiga brand in North America?

This case follows Kaspi.kz, a private equity (Baring Vostok) co-owned retail bank in Central Asia that evolved into a fintech, payments and e-commerce company. It provides insights into private equity financing, portfolio company management, and initial public offering practices. In particular, the case focuses on (i) the bank's journey from a traditional bank that serviced only corporations to an online platform, and (ii) the timing and process of preparation for an IPO. The management initially concentrated on profitability, but they soon shifted their emphasis to customer experience. The results were rewarding: Kaspi.kz became the number one player in online commerce, online payments, and consumer financing in Kazakhstan. The challenge of the IPO decisions is its timing: communicating the success of the fast transformation of the firm and its potential for further growth, especially in an emerging market like Kazakhstan, was far from trivial. From a business perspective, even a short delay of six months could potentially add millions of dollars to its value. Kaspi.kz's private equity investor was interested in commencing a formal exit via an IPO, but the valuation was an important consideration. The case also provides a unique insight into financial fragility of the retail banking model, and how integration into an e-commerce platform interacts with the retail banking model.

In October 2018, Chef Carme Ruscalleda, the most-starred woman chef in the world at the time, closed the doors of her Restaurant Sant Pau (Sant Pau), as she had on almost every night for the past 30 years-this time for the last time. Ruscalleda had opened the restaurant in 1988 with her husband and partner. Sant Pau had a rating of three Michelin stars, the highest rating available to a restaurant through the well-known MICHELIN Guide to fine dining. Her other two restaurants-Sant Pau Tokyo, a sister restaurant in Japan, and Moments, in Barcelona's Mandarin Oriental Hotel-had two Michelin stars each. Many people-from the village and around the world-were sad to see the iconic restaurant close after so many decades. The case describes her approach to cooking, managing teams, dealing with stress, running a family business and constantly reinventing herself.

In 1994, Antanas Mockus, an unlikely politician and former President of the prestigious National University of Colombia, became Bogotá's first independent mayor, bringing with him a unique vision of harmonious citizenship. The city's new leadership under Mockus, unlike in the past, included academics and researchers, who helped create a raft of new initiatives designed to align public behavior with the rule of law, through education and positive peer influence-or what was known as "citizenship culture." In his first year, Mockus addressed two big issues plaguing Bogotá, deadly traffic and violence, by using unconventional methods like hiring mimes to control traffic and restricting the sale of alcohol during certain times of year. Mockus later tackled the culture of lighting fireworks-a popular symbol of celebration in Colombia-which typically killed or injured hundreds of adults and children annually. In December 1995, at the beginning of the Christmas celebration season in Bogotá, Mockus faced a difficult decision. An eight-year-old boy had severely burned two of his fingers by lighting fireworks. Earlier that year, Mockus had arrived at a compromise agreement to allow limited sale of fireworks even though the number of fireworks-related injuries had risen steadily in recent years. The incremental approach required fireworks vendors to sell only to adults and to educate their customers about proper use. But if a single child in Bogotá was injured as a result of fireworks during the 1995 Christmas season, a full ban would come into effect. Part A of the case profiles Mockus's campaign for mayor and details the events that led up to the ban on fireworks. It traces how Mockus and his team tried to facilitate social change on fireworks by using a combination of public education, laws and moral pressure.

"In 1994, Antanas Mockus, an unlikely politician and former President of the prestigious National University of Colombia, became Bogotá's first independent mayor, bringing with him a unique vision of harmonious citizenship. The city's new leadership under Mockus, unlike in the past, included academics and researchers, who helped create a raft of new initiatives designed to align public behavior with the rule of law, through education and positive peer influence-or what was known as "citizenship culture." In his first year, Mockus addressed two big issues plaguing Bogotá, deadly traffic and violence, by using unconventional methods like hiring mimes to control traffic and restricting the sale of alcohol during certain times of year. Mockus later tackled the culture of lighting fireworks-a popular symbol of celebration in Colombia-which typically killed or injured hundreds of adults and children annually. In December 1995, at the beginning of the Christmas celebration season in Bogotá, Mockus faced a difficult decision. An eight-year-old boy had severely burned two of his fingers by lighting fireworks. Earlier that year, Mockus had arrived at a compromise agreement to allow limited sale of fireworks even though the number of fireworks-related injuries had risen steadily in recent years. The incremental approach required fireworks vendors to sell only to adults and to educate their customers about proper use. But if a single child in Bogotá was injured as a result of fireworks during the 1995 Christmas season, a full ban would come into effect. Part A of the case profiles Mockus's campaign for mayor and details the events that led up to the ban on fireworks. It traces how Mockus and his team tried to facilitate social change on fireworks by using a combination of public education, laws and moral pressure.

TeenSmart is an organization that offers information, counsel and online courses to young people ages ten to 24, mainly in Costa Rica and Nicaragua, on how to prevent the top six risky health behaviors: tobacco use, violence or accidental injuries, risky sexual practices, alcohol and drug use, poor nutritional habits and obesity, and lack of physical exercise. Founded in 2004 by Dr. Catherine (Cathy) S. Lindenberg, whose missionary grandparents created the first private hospital in Costa Rica, in recent years, the organization had received several awards for the impact of its work. However, at present, TeenSmart stood at the crossroads of whether to consolidate itself in the Central American region with its current service model or to rapidly expand into Latin America and beyond. Views varied among board members and it was up to Adriana Gómez, general director since 2015, to implement the decision, whatever it might be. Obstacles to expansion were huge. TeenSmart did not charge for its services and largely depended on donations from Cathy's family contacts and friends. The technological platform, designed to be used with its own text and audio applications in school computer labs, did not easily adapt to new content for use in smartphones. Some board members questioned the "scalability" of TeenSmart's existing model, based on promoters who sought alliances with schools and volunteers who provided online personalized advice to youngsters. Other members held that instead of serving such a reduced population, TeenSmart should form global alliances with technology companies that shared its mission and values.

Go (or Wei-ch'i, as it is known in China) is a centuries-old board game popular across Asia. Many have drawn parallels between military successes and the game's complex methods, in which a player encircles, isolates, and captures enemy pieces and geography, but Go also offers lessons for business. This technical note offers a basic description of Go, followed by a collection of business-strategy anecdotes punctuated by comparisons to Go strategies and quotes from Sun Tzu.