Thursday, March 1, 2012, 7:30 p.m.; Sunday, March 4, 2012, 7:30 a.m. Facebook IPO Estimates are pegging Facebook’s current valuation at $100 billion with its initial public offering coming up this spring. The social media giant will no doubt have the year’s most talked about IPO, but is it a good deal?

Finance professors Cliff Rossi, Albert "Pete" Kyle and Ethan Cohen-Cole are available to the media to discuss the broad range of implications surrounding the federal government’s $26 billion settlement with five major lenders that allegedly committed foreclosure abuses against homebuyers. The agreement settles yearlong federal and state probes against Ally Financial Inc., Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc., J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., and Wells Fargo & Co.

The University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business welcomes Bruce Richards, co-managing partner & CEO of Marathon Asset Management, to speak on Monday, March 12, 2012, on “An Insider’s View of How to Manage a Multi-Billion Dollar Hedge Fund.” Richards will discuss Marathon’s growth since its founding in 1998, the alternative investment marketplace, the current state of the markets, and investment strategy. The presentation is sponsored by the school's Center for Financial Policy and is a free event, open to the entire Smith School community.

Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012, 7:30 p.m.; Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012, 7:30 a.m. Housing Outlook: 2012 Where does the housing market go from here? In this edition of Smith Business Close-Up with the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business, Clifford Rossi, executive-in-residence of finance, shares his prognosis for the housing market for the year ahead.

COLLEGE PARK, Md. - Gerard Hoberg, associate professor of finance for the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland, is available to discuss how the anticipated Facebook IPO will affect the company and discuss the factors that would make Facebook or any IPO a good investment vehicle. The IPO filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission would be followed by Facebook’s initial public offering in about three months.

Media Alert: Jan. 18, 2012Attention: Financial and Economic Reporters/Editors UMD Business Experts Available to Comment on Insourcing Jobs; Federal Reserve Call for Action on Housing College Park, MD - Finance and management faculty experts at the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business weigh in on developments from recent proposals by the Federal Reserve and Obama Administration to boost the national economy. The Smith School has an in-house facility for live or taped interviews via fiber-optic line for television or multimedia content.

Faculty at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business have summarized 2012 forecasts for individual sectors of the national economy. “Several important dynamics frame the 2012 economic outlook,” said Cliff Rossi, Tyser Teacher Fellow and executive-in-residence. These factors include:

The annual Top 10 Summer Reading List for Business Leaders – as recommended by Robert H. Smith School of Business faculty and staff - is several and months and a change-of-season away. Perhaps something to whet reader appetites for the 2012 summer list, a few Smith leaders reflected on books they have recently read and recommend for winter reading. The following selections cover "behavioral" economics and finance, “dark” secrets of the Internet, the revolutionary effect of the shipping container, social media as a driver of social change, and more.

The Smith School congratulates the first place winners: Kishore Radhakrishnan, Jeff Williamowsky, Asheel Kakkad, Matthew Kannan, Gursean Singh and Aaron Fagan (not pictured) with event organizers Anna Mayr, John Chukundah and Elinda Kiss. Also shown in the photograph are the judges of the competition.

Robert H. Smith School of Business faculty members Cliff Rossi and Dilip B. Madan are among experts selected by U.S. Treasury officials to speak at a conference on financial reform. The event, "Macroprudential Toolkit: Measurement and Analysis" takes place Thursday and Friday, Dec. 1-2 at the Hyatt on Capitol Hill. (Macroprudential refers to focus on the financial system as a whole, as opposed to individual institutions, markets, and infrastructures).