Research Award

About CFA Society Greece's Research Award

CFA Society Greece's Research Award is an annual award that was launched in November 2021 and was awarded for the first time in April 2022.  

The purpose of the Research Award is to distinguish outstanding scientific and empirical research in the fields of investment, finance, economics, business and accounting that are useful for practitioners.

The winning paper is awarded a monetary prize. 

Research Award 2026 

To be announced.

Please contact us at [email protected]

Research Award 2025

CFA Society Greece's expert jury evaluated a record-breaking 18 papers independently and anonymously for the 4th Annual Research Award. 

Winning Paper

Imbalanced ESG Investing? 

by Maria-Eleni K. Agoraki, Georgios P. Kouretas, Haoran Wu, Binru Zhao

The winning paper, which is published in the Journal of Corporate Finance, investigates the imbalance of ESG investing across its Environmental (E), Social (S) and Governance (G) pillars. The authors found that E plays a more significant role in influencing the imbalance level, and mutual funds prioritize mitigating E risks over S and G risks, which is more pronounced in funds with higher sustainability ratings. Moreover, their findings indicate that investors respond to ESG imbalance, with the level of imbalance showing a negative impact on fund flows, especially for funds with higher sustainability ratings. However, this negative relationship is mitigated as climate change concerns increase. Furthermore, the authors found that political ideology plays a role in the ESG imbalance, with the imbalance of funds in blue states being more driven by lower environmental considerations compared to those in red states. Additionally, they observe that the ESG imbalance is positively associated with various fund risks. The study offers implications for policymakers and stakeholders in the asset management industry regarding ESG investing practices.

Download the paper   Press Release

Research Award 2024

CFA Society Greece's 4-member jury evaluated six (6) papers independently and anonymously for the 3rd Annual Research Award. 

Winning Paper

Does ESG reputational risk affect the efficiency and speed of adjustment of corporate investment?

by Ioannis Chasiotis, Dimitrios Gounopoulos, Dimitrios Konstantios,  Vasilios‐Christos Naoum,  Victoria Patsika

The winning paper, which is published in European Financial Management, explores the relationship between environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reputational risk and investment efficiency. The authors provide evidence that ESG reputational risk relates to higher corporate suboptimal investment (underinvestment) and a lower speed of adjustment back to the optimal investment level. Their findings hold for parametric and non‐parametric estimations of underinvestment and are robust to several techniques that address endogeneity and self‐selection. Overall, the study highlights the important role of ESG reputational risk in determining corporate investment efficiency.

Download the paper   Press Release

Research Award 2023

CFA Society Greece's 4-member jury evaluated seven (7) papers independently and anonymously for the 2nd Annual Research Award. 

Winning Paper

Enhancement in a Firm's Information Environment via Options Trading and the Efficiency of Corporate Investment

by S. Anagnostopolou, CFA, L. Trigeorgis and A. Tsekrekos

The winning paper, which is published in the Journal of Banking and Finance, examines the association between enhancement in a firm’s information environment via options trading and firm investment efficiency.  Investment inefficiency is partly driven by information asymmetries between firm managers and capital providers, aggravating moral hazard concerns. The authors test whether enhancement in a firm’s information environment through higher volumes of options trading (including a natural experiment involving exogenous shocks via the Penny Pilot Program) is positively related to more efficient firm investment decisions. Their results confirm that enhanced informational efficiency via higher volumes of options trading is positively related to improvements in firm-level investment efficiency. Their findings are in line with the enhancement in the information environment stemming from options trading reducing agency and moral hazard concerns (an agency channel) and are not driven by alternative explanations such as managerial learning from informed traders or the lower cost of capital. Overall, the authors' findings suggest that an enhanced information environment via more options trading benefits firms’ investment decisions.

Download the paper   Press Release

Research Award 2022

Our panel of experts evaluated nine (9) submissions for the 2022 Research Award, ranging in topics from accounting conservatism to cost of capital analysis. 

The winning paper of the first Research Award is Positive stock information in out-of-the-money option prices by Konstantinos Gkionis (UBS), Alexandros Kostakis (University of Liverpool), Georgios Skiadopoulos (University of Piraeus and Queen Mary University of London) and Przemyslaw S. Stilger (Standard Chartered Bank).

In this paper, the authors document that stocks with high risk-neutral skewness outperform, and propose and empirically validate a novel trading mechanism which explains this.  Apart from academics, this research is of interest to investors and portfolio managers. This is manifested by that fact that it attracted the attention of Media, including the Global Investor Group which features it here . Also reproduced by Fintech Zoom. 

Read the full paper