News Release

Faculty forum will lend perspective to U.S. recession

January 26, 2010

The next installment in the Penn State Harrisburg series of academic perspectives on current events will feature an in-depth look at the current U.S. recession.

A panel of five faculty members from the college’s School of Business Administration will discuss “The U.S. Recession: Is it over? Where do we go from here?” at noon Wednesday, Feb. 3 in the Gallery Lounge of the Olmsted Building. The presentation is free and open to the public.

The discussion will be moderated by Associate Professor of Finance Oranee Tawatnuntchai with Associate Professor of Economics Nihal Bayraktar, Assistant Professor of Finance Patrick Cusatis, Assistant Professor of Economics Ji Wu, and retired Assistant Professor of Economics Vedula Murti as panelists.

Tawatnuntchai has taught courses in financial management, problems in finance, corporate finance, investments, and portfolio management. Her research interests include agency costs, dividend policy, corporate finance, and investments and emerging markets.

Prior to joining the Penn State faculty in 2003, Bayraktar worked at the World Bank as an economist. Her basic research interests include microeconomic foundations of macroeconomics, fixed investment behavior of manufacturing firms in the U.S. and Germany, and problems related to inflation, poverty, the banking sector, and financial markets in developing countries.

A Penn State instructor since 1993, Cusatis was formerly a senior vice president in charge of municipal derivatives and municipal marketing at Tucker-Anthony, a director at CoreStates Bank, and a specialist in municipal new product development for Lehman Brothers in New York City. His research includes corporate restructuring, derivative securities, portfolio management, fixed income capital markets, and municipal finance.

Wu, a faculty member since 2008, was formerly an analyst at the Central Bank in China. His research interests include open economy macroeconomics, monetary economics, and international banking.

Murti retired in 2003 after a 34-year Penn State teaching career which included leadership of the finance and economics programs. He has served as a guest lecturer in economics and business at a number of colleges and universities.