Yale University Course: Financial Markets

About the Course

Financial institutions are a pillar of civilized society, supporting people in their productive ventures and managing the economic risks they take on. The workings of these institutions are important to comprehend if we are to predict their actions today and their evolution in the coming information age. The course strives to offer understanding of the theory of finance and its relation to the history, strengths and imperfections of such institutions as banking, insurance, securities, futures, and other derivatives markets, and the future of these institutions over the next century.

About Professor Robert Shiller

Robert J. Shiller is Arthur M. Okun Professor of Economics at Yale University and a Fellow at the International Center for Finance at the Yale School of Management. Specializing in behavioral finance and real estate, Professor Shiller has published in Journal of Financial Economics, American Economic Review, Journal of Finance, Wall Street Journal, and Financial Times. His books include Market Volatility, Macro Markets (for which he won the TIAA-CREF\'s Paul A. Samuelson Award), Irrational Exuberance, and The New Financial Order: Risk in the Twenty-First Century.

1. Finance and Insurance as Powerful Forces in Our Economy and Society
2. The Universal Principle of Risk Management: Pooling and the Hedging of Risks
3. Technology and Invention in Finance
4. Portfolio Diversification and Supporting Financial Institutions (CAPM Model)
5. Insurance: The Archetypal Risk Management Institution
6. Efficient Markets vs. Excess Volatility
7. Behavioral Finance: The Role of Psychology
8. Human Foibles, Fraud, Manipulation, and Regulation
9. Guest Lecture by David Swensen
10. Debt Markets: Term Structure
Midterm Exam 1
11. Stocks
12. Real Estate Finance and Its Vulnerability to Crisis
13. Banking: Successes and Failures
14. Guest Lecture by Andrew Redleaf
15. Guest Lecture by Carl Icahn
16. The Evolution and Perfection of Monetary Policy
Midterm Exam 2
17. Investment Banking and Secondary Markets
18. Professional Money Managers and Their Influence
19. Brokerage, ECNs, etc.
20. Guest Lecture by Stephen Schwarzman
21. Forwards and Futures
22. Stock Index, Oil and Other Futures Markets
23. Options Markets
24. Making It Work for Real People: The Democratization of Finance
25. Learning from and Responding to Financial Crisis, Part I (Guest Lecture by Lawrence Summers)
26. Learning from and Responding to Financial Crisis, Part II (Guest Lecture by Lawrence Summers)