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This paper discusses the concept of hidden assets in the context of Disney’s 2009 acquisition of the Marvel Entertainment Group (Marvel), and its value realization activities post-acquisition.

The paper presents a hidden assets-based value realization analysis of the 2009 acquisition of Marvel by Disney. It draws on a previously published case study of that acquisition as well as further research conducted by the author.

The Disney-Marvel acquisition supports the view that hidden assets-based analysis can be a powerful M&A tool and an equally powerful value realization tool when managed strategically over time.

The Disney acquisition of Marvel is a dramatic example of how knowledge of hidden assets can be used to do a deal in a competitive marketplace and how the disciplined management of those assets over time can realize a “blue ocean” of value post-acquisition.

This is the first paper we are aware that evaluates the hidden assets of the Disney-Marvel acquisition. It follows another paper that evaluated the acquisition (Joseph Calandro, Jr., “Disney’s Marvel Acquisition: A Strategic Financial Analysis,” Strategy & Leadership, Vol. 38, No. 2 (2010), pp. 42-51), which followed a paper that evaluated Marvel’s 1996 bankruptcy filing (Joseph Calandro, Jr., “Distressed M&A and Corporate Strategy: Lessons from Marvel Entertainment Group’s Bankruptcy,” Strategy & Leadership, Vol. 37, No. 4 (2009), pp. 23-32).

The purpose of the paper is to address customer alienation risk in the context of Marvel's recent (as of June 2023) under-performance and its contribution to Disney's stock's 50 percent-plus decline.

Research followed recent developments at Disney/Marvel, as well as the Bud Light customer alienation, and reconciled those developments to core brand and strategic risk management resources to derive practical suggestions to mitigate customer alienation risk across industries.

Marvel’s experience offers lessons that have relevance across industries inasmuch as a super hero paradigm is effectively a brand. The stronger the bond between customers and a brand, the more customers will maintain or extend their buying patterns over time. And the more customers personally identify with a brand, the greater the likelihood a customer alienation will occur if a firm disrespects that bond. Four practical suggestions are presented that will help to ensure the integrity of brands.

While the under-performance of Disney/Marvel has been (and is) covered in the press, this is the first paper that we are aware of that links that under-performance to customer alienation risk.

This paper offers a practical overview of the U.S. credit cycle and the challenges it poses, along with a perspective on where we seem to be in the cycle in early 2023. Suggestions are then offered for how corporate executives can address cyclical challenges from a corporate strategy perspective.

The United States credit cycle was out into context by following the trend of Moody’s Baa corporate bond yields from January 1919 to November 2022. Under the Moody’s rating system, Baa is the lowest level of investment grade credit, and as such it possesses speculative characteristics that are sensitive to cyclical dynamics. Another reason for choosing Baa credit patterns for analysis is data availability: over 100-years of continuous Baa data is searchable at the U.S. Federal Reserve.

The prior credit cycle wave of progressively lower inflation and interest rates began in 1982 and ended in 2020. The current credit cycle of wave of progressively higher inflation and interest rates will present strategic risks and opportunities that executives will increasingly have to deal with.

This is the first corporate strategy paper we are aware that practically addresses the credit cycle change. It is also the first paper we are aware that provides practical suggestions on how to address that change from a corporate strategy perspective.

This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoints practical implications from cutting‐edge research and case studies.

This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.

Joseph Calandro Jr, Ranganna Dasari and Scott Lane, in their collaborative article “Berkshire Hathaway and GEICO: an M&A case study”, explain in detail the success of one of the world's great entrepreneurs: Warren Buffett. This is a study in a particular methodology of evaluation, the Graham and Dodd (G&D) valuation approach, and how it was applied by Buffett in Berkshire Hathaway's 1995 acquisition of the US insurance giant, GEICO.

Provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world's leading organizations.

The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy‐to‐digest format.

The author offers executives a strategic process for proactively mitigating the risk of catastrophic unwanted Black Swan surprises that can severely, and often abruptly, impair a balance sheet.

One practical way to apply the author’s approach is through hedging concentrated balance sheet exposures when market volatility is low or contracting.

Though no one can reliably anticipate pandemics and related stock market turbulence, executives do not have to predict the future to economically protect their balance sheets from Black Swan events.

Managers can construct Black Swan scenarios to assess how an unforeseen, disadvantageous future could develop and which risk management derivative would best mitigate it.

This strategic approach to managing balance-sheet-threatening risks could help a firm outperform its competitors during future crises and catastrophes.

All too often M&A deal making falls into the trap of head-to-head competition that drives valuations to “sky-high” levels. The author suggests ways to avoid the trap. 10; 10; 10;

Four lesser-known corporate development strategies offer lucrative alternatives to engaging in an M&A bidding war.

One strategy: The derivatives market allows executives to acquire financial products to hedge their material balance sheet exposures when market pricing is incredibly low.

Relatively few acquirers make initial “toehold” investments in their targets prior to making a bid.

The strategic logic of hyper-efficient resource utilization has rarely been popular, despite how “obvious” it may initially appear. Most executives seem psychologically oriented to a growth-based approach irrespective of the risks that approach may generate over time. 10;

The books, The Innovator’s Dilemma and Fooled by Randomness were best-sellers, and both books’ authors rightly have legions of followers. Nevertheless, the dynamics each author analyzed so well continue to plague many executives. Why? Is there some way to close the analytical loop between these two extremes? Put another way, is there a practical method of being productive and profitable in “normal” environments while at the same time working to capitalize on the impact of volatile disruption? This paper presents a practical approach for doing so that builds on prior research.

This paper differentiates between the normal, linear environment of “business as usual” (BaU) and the volatile, nonlinear environments of disruption to both upside and the downside. It then profiles how to navigate each environment, illustrated by way of examples.

Our findings, which are supported by historical and contemporary examples, are that leading executives consistently navigate the environments of BaU and disruption due to explicit strategic decisions based on an “information advantage,” which is knowledge that their competitors either do not have or choose to ignore. Such advantages are monetized by efficient operations in BaU and by economically, which is to say strategically, benefiting from disruptive volatility to the upside and/or avoiding it on the downside, over time.

Managerial focus should be directed to potentially disruptive innovations and other kinds of ambiguous threats, which could develop to be strategically significant over time, and these need to be tracked in a meaningful way. To benefit from an information advantage, executives must selectively – that is, strategically – make small investments that could either payoff dynamically or economically mitigate the risk of extreme losses over time.

This paper offers executives a practical explanation why the environments of BaU and disruption must be analyzed and planned for separately by different functions. Doing so facilitates the efficient realization of corporate goals and objectives over time in both normal (linear) and highly volatile (nonlinear) environments.

The principles of value investing present an alternative way to strategically approach the challenges and opportunities generated from the global risk landscape.

The principles of value investing – based on the lessons learned from highly successful practitioners – can be distilled into six core managerial considerations.

In theory, the prescriptions of value investing appear straightforward, but executives need to augment their skillsets with those of both an astute investor and discerning banker, balance their attention between conventional and non-traditional sources of information, and exhibit the patience and grit to go against the herd and focus on longer-term compounded returns.

The concept of “rationality” is a way of monitoring executive behavior to ensure that stated goals, objectives and strategies reconcile to business actions over time.

Insights for corporate leaders, investors, M&A teams and activists. These six principles will likely be increasingly valuable during the challenging times ahead: Adding cost-effective resource allocation to the strategy tool kit. Conservative financing. Balancing non-traditional and traditional information. Clarity about the complexity of risk. Humility in times of uncertainty. Focusing on compounded returns.

The property and casualty insurance industry has historically focused on the underwriting ratio as the primary measure of operating performance. Many dramatic changes have occurred in this industry and its operating environment over the past 30 years. These changes have dramatically decreased opportunities for underwriting profits, forcing the industry to rely more on investment returns and careful reinsurance. An alternative performance measurement system, the insurance performance measure (IPM), is presented and illustrated. The IPM integrates these other areas of operating activity into a more comprehensive measure of profitability.

This paper aims to consider how top corporate executives in a variety of industries can find important lessons in the recently published sixth edition of Benjamin Graham and David Dodd's Security Analysis (New York: McGraw‐Hill, 2008).

This paper includes an interview with the lead editor of the book, value investor Seth Klarman. He explains key strategic lessons that non‐financial executives can learn from the value investing concepts and methodology.

The insights contained within Security Analysis can and should be leveraged by business leaders and strategists to create value for their firms.

Graham and Dodd‐based valuation and investment is a viable method with which to assess corporate strategic initiatives (such as mergers and acquisitions, share buy‐backs, etc.).

This paper, the first in a business strategy journal, explains how business leaders can become adept at using modern applications of Graham and Dodd‐based valuation insights and technology to inform their strategic decision‐making.