In 2002, CJEB decided to develop a new Program on Alternative Investments, initially using its internal seed money for funding. The Center recognized that it could serve the public by providing substantive, objective information and analysis concerning hedge funds, private equity, sovereign wealth funds, and other alternative investments as they related to Japan and the broader East Asian region. Since then CJEB has successfully engaged in a range of activities involving a large number of practitioners,with the goal of stimulating discussion between academics and businesspeople in the field and to forge closer ties between Columbia Business School and the business world.
Over time what had been termed “alternative investments” has entered the mainstream of finance as portfolio managers expanded their horizons. Accordingly, CJEB decided to bring the program to an end as of June 30, 2009, while continuing to involve alternative investment institutions, instruments, and markets in its ongoing research and related activities on Japanese finance.
The final three years of the program were led by Alicia Ogawa, an expert on the Japanese banking industry with a distinguished career in equity research and its management, including fifteen years in Japan and as a managing director at Lehman Brothers. Professor Ogawa, now a senior advisor at the Center, was instrumental in organizing several events this year, including two large conferences in Tokyo: “The Japanese Government as a Portfolio Manager: Managing the Nation’s Wealth” on October 21, 2008; and “The Financial and Economic Futures of Japan and the U.S.” on May 14, 2009.
The Center is especially grateful to Nomura Holdings, Inc., Daido Life Insurance Company, and Advantage Partners, LLP for their support of our Program on Alternative Investments. Without their strong support and encouragement, this Program would not have been possible.
The Program on Alternative Investments was supported by an Academic Advisory Board that provided intellectual guidance and was composed of leading faculty in relevant fields at Columbia Business School.
They included:
- Franklin R. Edwards, Director, Center for the Study of Futures Markets and Arthur F. Burns Professor of Free and Competitive Enterprise
- Larry Glosten, Chair, Economics and Finance Division and S. Sloan Colt Professor of Banking and International Finance
- Robert Hodrick, Nomura Professor of International Finance
- R. Glenn Hubbard, Dean and Russell L. Carson Professor of Finance and Economics
- Christopher J. Mayer, Director, M.B.A. Real Estate Program and Milstein Center for Real Estate, and Paul Milstein Professor of Real Estate
View past events and download publications drawn from these programs.