Distinguished Faculty Lecture: Ben Branch
Ben S. Branch, department of finance and operations management, will give the first talk in the 2007-08 Distinguished Faculty Lecture Series. His talk is titled, “If Markets Aren't Efficient, Why Aren’t You Getting Rich?”
Are markets efficient—in other words, are they able to incorporate the available information into prices quickly and effectively? Why do most professional investors only earn average returns? Where do the Warren Buffets fit in? Professor Branch will address these questions and discuss how investors tired of 5% CD rates could earn at least the historic market average of 9% to 11% and perhaps build on the little opportunities that would allow them to do somewhat better.
Professor Branch joined the faculty in 1975 and is a professor of Finance and Operations Management at the Isenberg School of Management. He was acting department chairman in the spring of 1999; doctoral program director for ISOM from 1989-91; associate chairman of the department of General Business and Finance from 1982-85 and acting chairman in the summer of 1981; and chairman of the ISOM management personnel committee from 1982-83 and 2005-present. Prior to coming to campus, Professor Branch was an assistant professor of economics at Dartmouth College from 1970-75.
In addition to his teaching and research interests in investment, corporate finance, bankruptcies, strategic planning, futures markets, corporate finance and industrial organizations, Professor Branch has served as a Chapter 7 bankruptcy trustee for the Bank of New England Corporation from 1991 to the present. Professor Branch was a director of Proactive Technologies Corp. from 1997-99 and manager of VFBLLC from 2001-present. He was the chairman of the senior unsecured creditors committee of the First Republic Bank Corporation from 1989-91 and chairman of the board from 1991-94. He was an ex officio director of the BankEast Corporation from 1991-93. He is a member of the Academic Advisory Council of the Turnaround Management Association from 1999-present.
Professor Branch earned his bachelor's degree in mathematics from Emory University in 1965; a master's degree in economics from the University of Texas in 1968 and a master's degree and doctorate in economics from the University of Michigan in 1969 and 1970, respectively.
A reception follows immediately after the lecture. Open to the public.
