CFA Society Toronto is proud to announce this year’s recipient of the CFA Society Toronto Fellowship Award, Xiaoqiao Wang, Queen’s University, for her thesis, “Exploring the Hidden Risks in Firm Operations and their Financial Impacts.”

“I am delighted to receive encouragement and recognition for my thesis. As a committed professional in this field, I am determined to pursue advanced studies and research to further explore corporate finance and international finance mechanisms and help market participants make better financial arrangements,” said Wang.

The annual award is open to doctoral candidates whose dissertation proposals have been approved by participating Ontario universities with doctoral programs in the field of finance or economics but whose final dissertation has not been approved. Dissertation proposals are judged on their potential to add to the body of knowledge about Canadian debt, equity, or derivatives and other markets, with particular emphasis on regulation, accounting, corporate governance, taxation, applied securities valuation, portfolio management, and performance attribution. The winning research paper was selected by a panel of judges from among eight submissions and received a $10,000 cash prize.

Xiaoqiao’s paper explores the hidden risks in a firm’s real operating process and the financial adjustments made to accommodate these risks. These constraints include risk increases with customer specificity, threats surrounding a firm’s geographic location, and the decrease of the firm’s systematic business risk associated with the negative impact from supplier immobility on the book-to-market beta in the Fama−French three factor pricing model.

“Xiaoqiao provides a thorough and insightful analysis of how operational factors affect firms’ risk and their associated financial decisions such as capital structure and dividend policies,” said Dr. Sean Cleary, CFA, BMO Professor of Finance and Director of the Master of Finance Program at Queen’s School of Business, Queen’s University.