Degrees

• Ph.D. University of California at Berkeley
• B.A. Yale

About

Personal Faculty Website

John Wald is a professor of finance and has been at UTSA since 2006.  Prior to teaching at UTSA, John was on the faculties of Penn State and Rutgers Universities.  He holds a doctorate in economics from the University of California at Berkeley and a bachelor’s in computer science and economics/math from Yale.

His research has focused on how legal differences between states and countries affect firm financing decisions as well as on debt covenant agreements, CEO compensation, and how the flu affects stock markets.

His papers have won several awards, including the 2008 FMA best paper in international finance, the 2008 Werner Pemmerehne Prize, and the 2009 Mirae Asset Securities Co., Ltd. Outstanding Paper Award.  He also won the 2010 Carlos Alvarez College of Business tenured faculty research award.  John is currently on the editorial review board for the Journal of International Business Studies and an associate editor of the Review of Pacific Basin Financial Markets and Policies.

Research Interests

• Capital structure
• Law and finance
• Corporate governance
• International finance

Selected Publications

• “Creditor Protection Laws, Debt Financing and Corporate Investment Over the Business Cycle,” (with Qi Yaxuan and Lukas Roth), Journal of International Business Studies, Vol. 48, 2017, pp. 477-497.
• “Liability Protection, Director Compensation, and Incentives,” with Iness Aguir, Natasha Burns, Sattar Mansi, Journal of Financial Intermediation, forthcoming.
• “Severance Agreements and the Cost of Debt,” Journal of Financial Markets, Vol. 41, 2016, pp. 426-444.
• “Time Series Momentum and Volatility Scaling,” (with Abby Kim and Yiuman Tse), Journal of Financial Markets, Vol. 30, 2016, pp. 103-124.
• “The Debt Trap: Wealth Transfers and Capital Structure Choice,” Financial Review, Vol. 51, No. 1, 2016, pp. 5-35.
• “Director Liability Protection, Earnings Management, and Audit Pricing,” (with Sarfraz Khan), Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, Vol. 12, No. 4, 2015, pp. 781-814.
• “Do Stock Markets Catch the Flu?” with Brian McTier and Yiuman Tse, Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Vol. 48, 2013, pp. 979-1000.
• “Too Much Pay Performance Sensitivity?” with Ivan Brick and Oded Palmon, Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 94, 2012, pp. 287-303.
• “How Legal Environments Affect the Use of Covenants,” with Yaxuan Qi and Lukas Roth, Journal of International Business Studies, Vol.42, 2011, pp. 235-262.
• “Political Rights and the Cost of Debt,” with Yaxuan Qi and Lukas Roth, Journal of Financial Economics, Vol. 95, 2010, pp. 202-226.
• “Creditor Protection Laws and the Cost of Debt,” with Sattar Mansi and William Maxwell, Journal of Law & Economics,Vol. 52, 2009, pp. 701-726.
• “The Effect of State Laws on Capital Structure,” with Michael S. Long, Journal of Financial Economics, Vol. 83, No. 2, 2007, pp. 297-320.