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PHD MENTORING DAY Coordinator

The PhD Mentoring Day will be held on July 2, 2025, one day prior to the start of the 32nd Finance Forum coordinated by Scientific Committee Director, Roberto Steri (University of Luxembourg).

ROBERTO STERI

Roberto Steri is an assistant professor of finance at the University of Luxembourg. Previously, he was an assistant professor at HEC Lausanne and an adjunct professor of economics at Duke University, where he taught an elective class in the Daytime MBA program. He earned his Ph.D. in finance from Bocconi University, following a degree in engineering from the Polytechnic University of Milan. During his doctoral studies, Roberto was a visiting scholar at Duke University and the Central European University. Roberto’s research has been published in leading finance journals, and he has consistently advised and mentored Ph.D. students throughout his career. His current research interests include the interplay between corporate financing and stock prices, dynamic corporate finance, financial intermediation, computational methods in economics, and the optimal design of procurement auctions. Before transitioning to academia, Roberto gained industry experience as a banking consultant and mergers and acquisitions analyst.

Invited Professors

DIANA BONFIM

Diana Bonfim is a senior economist (Team Lead) in the Financial Intermediation Division of the Economics and Research Department of Banco de Portugal and an adjunct full professor at Católica Lisbon School of Business and Economics.  She is a CEPR Research Fellow in Banking and Corporate Finance and in Monetary Economics and Fluctuations. Her research interests comprise empirical banking, corporate finance, and the transmission of monetary policy. She has published in leading journals in finance, such as the Journal of Financial Economics, Management Science or Review of Finance. She is co-editor of the International Journal of Central Banking and associate editor of the Journal of Financial Intermediation, Journal of Financial Stability, Emerging Markets Review and Economic Notes.

FERNANDO ZAPATERO

Fernando Zapatero is the Richard D. Cohen Professor in Management in the Questrom School of Business at Boston University and the Chair of the Finance Department. Before that he was the Robert G. Kirby Chair in Behavioral Finance in the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California. He has coauthored the textbook Introduction to the Economics and Mathematics of Financial Markets and authored or coauthored over forty published articles. His main research interests are in Asset Pricing and Behavioral Finance.

MENTORS

We will also have a group of outstanding mentors attending students’ presentations and offering them valuable feedback:

Andrés Almazan – McCombs School of Business, The University of Texas at Austin
Dante Amengual – CEMFI
Javier Suarez – CEMFI
Juan Pedro Gómez – IE Business School
David Martínez Miera – Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
José Penalva – Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
Pablo Ruiz-Verdú – Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
Anna Toldrà-Simats – Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
Sergio Vicente – University of Luxembourg
Rafael Zambrana – University of Notre Dame

Phd MENTORING DAY – PROGRAM OVERVIEW

WEDNESDAY, JULY 2, 2025 

 

8:45-9:00 Registration Main Hall
9:00-9:15 Welcome to the PhD Mentoring Day
Roberto Steri (University of Luxembourg)
A-005
9:15-10:15 Mentoring Advice I
Diana Bonfim (Banco de Portugal, ECB, Católica Lisbon)
A-005
10:15-10:45 Coffee Break Cafetería
10:45-13:05 Morning Parallel Sessions
I.   Asset Pricing
II. Corporate Finance
A-005
A-006
13:05-14:30 Lunch Break El Txoko del Sadar
14:30-16:50 Afternoon Parallel Sessions
III. Intermediaries
IV. Banking
A-005
A-006
17:00-18:00 Mentoring Advice II
Fernando Zapatero (Boston University)
A-005
18:00-18:15 Farewell
Roberto Steri (University of Luxembourg)
A-005

PhD MENTORING DAY – PARALLEL SESSIONS DETAILS

I. Asset Pricing

July 2, 2025, 10:45 to 13:05
Location: A-005
Session Chair:   Dante Amengual (CEMFI)
Mentors:              Juan-Pedro Gómez (IE Business School)
                                   Jose Penalva (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid)

Short Sales and the Cash Flow Channel: Evidence from FOMC Announcements
Presenter: Bogdan Stankovski (Vienna Graduate School of Finance)

Does Retail Order Flow Internalization Increase Information Acquisition?
Presenter: David García-Méndez (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid)

Pairs-Trading a Sparse Synthetic Control
Presenter: Jesús Villota-Miranda (CEMFI)

Asset Systematic Risk and Capital Structure
Presenter: Javier Martinez (Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha)

II. Corporate Finance

July 2, 2025, 10:45 to 13:05
Location: A-006
Session Chair:   Andres Almazan (University of Texas at Austin)
Mentors:              Anna Toldrà (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid)
                                   Roberto Steri (University of Luxembourg)

Female Skin in the Game: Bridging the Gender Financing Gap
Presenter: Kristine Sahakyan (ESCP Business School)

Do the elements of biodiversity affect financial risk? An analysis for US firms
Presenter: Almudena García-Sanz (Universidad Complutense de Madrid)

The Strategic ESG Talk and Investor Bias
Presenter: Fangfang Wang (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona)

Competition Laws and Corporate Financial Structure. A Channel Analysis
Presenter: Amós Garcia Martinez (Universidad de Oviedo)

III. Intermediaries

July 2, 2025, 14:30 to 16:50
Location: A-005
Session Chair:   Fernando Zapatero (Boston university)
Mentors:              Pablo Ruiz-Verdú (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid)
                                   Rafael Zambranana (University of Notre Dame)

Asset (and Data) Managers
Presenter: Marco Zanotti (Swiss Finance Institute; USI Lugano)

Man vs. Machine: The Influence of AI Forecasts on Investor Beliefs
Presenter: Francesco Stradi (KU Leuven)

How to Model Bank Competition: The Case for Cournot
Presenter: Chiara Lattanzio (University College London)

Does your neighbor’s debt crowd out yours?
Presenter: Sameh Marei (ESADE Business School)

IV. Banking

July 2, 2025, 14:30 to 16:50
Location: A-005
Session Chair:   Diana Bonfim (Banco de Portugal, ECB, Católica Lisbon)
Mentors:              David Martíne-Miera (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid)
                                  Sergio Vicente (University of Luxembourg)
                                  Javier Suarez (CEMFI)

Real Effects of Bernanke-Kuttner: The Risk Channel of Monetary Policy on Corporate Investment
Presenter: Zhou Ren (Vienna Graduate School of Finance)

Anything but Equity – On Banks’ Preference for Hybrid Debt
Presenter: Tanja Brieden (Vienna Graduate School of Finance)

Balancing Trade-offs: Bank Run Risk and Interest Rate Risk Management for Small Banks
Presenter: Debosmita Chatterjee (City St George’s University of London)

The expected loss model and model-based regulation: unintended effects on income smoothing
Presenter: Mariana González Alzueta (Universidad de Oviedo