£1.5m grant for finance study

Professor Donald MacKenzie has been awarded a European Commission grant, worth more than £1.5 million, to investigate evaluation practices in financial markets.

The project, EPIFM, will explore from a social science perspective how finance professionals evaluate financial instruments, such as shares and bonds, and how these evaluation practices impact on the operation of financial markets.

Methodology

The cross-disciplinary research team will study evaluation practices within their technological and institutional settings.

The researchers will gather information through a combination of:

• semi-structured interviewing
• fieldwork at finance industry conferences and training courses
• documentary analysis
• direct observation of practices, where possible.

It is hoped the project will help develop a new research specialism in social studies of finance.

Research awards

This was one of 16 awards granted to the College of Humanities & Social Sciences during the month of June.

To find out more about other awards granted across the University, read ERI’s KPI reports.

Photo credit: Erik Dolle