kamakura blog

   
   
Author: Donald van Deventer Created: 3/10/2009 8:52 AM
Born and brought up in California, Don holds a Ph.D. in Business Economics, a joint degree of the Harvard University Department of Economics and the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration. Don currently services on the Board of Directors of the Harvard Alumni Association and on the Alumni Council of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. He also holds a degree in mathematics and economics from Occidental College, where he graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa. Don founded Kamakura Corporation in April 1990 and currently serves as its chairman and chief executive officer where he focuses on enterprise wide risk management and modern credit risk technology. His primary financial consulting and research interests involve the practical application of leading edge financial

Throughout the 2007-2009 credit crisis, we’ve heard “too big to fail” over and over again.  Somewhat less frequently, we’ve heard “too small to succeed,” a phrase about those banks who were in trouble but not big enough to be rescued by the U.S. government.  What these troubled times call for are banks that are “Too smart to fail.”  This blog looks at what it takes to meet that standard.

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The U.S. Treasury has just publicized a review of the Treasury’s methodologies for valuation warrants issued to the Treasury as compensation for the government rescues of distressed financial institutions.  Kamakura’s Managing Director for Research Robert A. Jarrow was retained by the Treasury to author this review.  We summarize Professor Jarrow’s insights and add comments in this blog.

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Today’s blog is a request for help from our loyal readers. I am writing on behalf of my Harvard classmate and fellow director of Kamakura Corporation, Dean V. Vance Roley of the Shidler College of Business at the University of Hawaii.  We would like to call your attention to two very generous scholarships available to students from Japan for the Masters in Financial Engineering Program at the University of Hawaii. 

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Joseph Tibman’s The Murder of Lehman Brothers is a great complement to Lawrence G. McDonald’s A Colossal Failure of Common Sense.  This blog is a reflection on Lehman and the points that Joe Tibman raises.

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Our post on October 15, 2009 on glass boxes versus black boxes has prompted a lot of feedback.  Three loyal readers provide feedback today on the danger of black boxes in risk management, why they’ve persisted as long as they have, and how risk management fits in.

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