The Annual Conference on Financial Market Regulation accepted its first paper submissions in 2013 and the first conference was held in the spring of 2014, co-hosted by the Securities and Exchange Commission's Division of Economic and Risk Analysis (DERA), Lehigh University’s Center for Financial Services, and the University of Virginia's Mayo Center for Asset Management. During its twelve-year history, the conference has grown in global stature and selectivity, with a current paper acceptance rate of 3%.
During the last decade plus, 122 papers have been presented and discussed, and 40% of them went on to be published in prominent journals such as the Review of Finance, Management Science, Journal of Accounting Research, Journal of Financial Economics, The Review of Financial Studies, The Review of Asset Pricing Studies, American Economic Review, Journal of Finance, Journal of Accounting and Economics, Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, The Economist, and The Quarterly Journal of Economics, among others.
CFMR 2025 CALL FOR PAPERS
Conference Dates: The conference will take place in the afternoon on Thursday, May 15 and all day on Friday, May 16, 2025.
Location: SEC Headquarters, Washington, DC
Paper Submission Deadline: November 18, 2024
Conference Details: The SEC Division of Economic and Risk Analysis (DERA), Lehigh University’s Center for Financial Services (CFS), and University of Virginia’s Richard A. Mayo Center for Asset Management (Mayo Center) will jointly host the 12th Annual Conference on Financial Market Regulation (CFMR 2025). The goal of the conference is to bring together participants for an exchange of views on topics of relevance to the Commission.
Two papers will be selected in each of five topic areas: asset management, corporate finance, enforcement, financial intermediation, and market microstructure and trading. Possible topics include, but are not limited to:
- Asset Management: investment advisers, ETPs and liquidity, investment companies, hedge funds, and other institutional investors, and custody.
- Corporate Finance: corporate disclosures, initial public offerings, seasoned equity offerings, corporate mergers and acquisitions, fintech, corporate governance and voting, corporate and municipal debt offerings, and disclosures related to asset-backed securities.
- Enforcement: compliance, fraud detection, whistleblower, penalties, deterrence, measurement of damages, AAERs, manipulation, Ponzi schemes, false disclosure, and insider trading.
- Intermediaries: broker-dealers, financial institutions, analysts affiliated with broker-dealers or financial institutions, clearing agencies, central counterparties, credit ratings, and Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organizations (NRSROs).
- Market Microstructure and Trading: the structure, transparency, fairness, efficiency, and liquidity of secondary market trading in the equity, ETP, bond, option, security-based swap, and securities lending markets.
The deadline for paper submissions is November 18, 2024 with a submission fee of $50. Papers can be submitted through ConfTool (www.conftool.org/cfmr2025).
The selection committee will focus on high quality paper submissions whose topics directly relate to the mission of the SEC. Authors of accepted papers will be notified by the beginning of February. Travel expenses are the responsibility of the presenters, but the conference fee is waived.
Conference Organizers: Kathleen Weiss Hanley (Lehigh University), Amy Edwards (SEC), Vlad Ivanov (SEC), and Pedro Matos (University of Virginia)
11th Annual Conference on Financial Market Regulation (CFMR 2024)
The SEC’s Division of Economic and Risk Analysis (DERA), Lehigh University’s Center for Financial Services (CFS), and University of Maryland’s Center for Financial Policy (CFP) jointly hosted the 11th Annual Conference on Financial Market Regulation (CFMR 2024) on Thursday, May 9 and Friday, May 10, 2024. The goal of the conference is to bring together participants from academia, industry, government, and the SEC for an exchange of views on topics of relevance to the Commission.
SEC Chair Gary Gensler and SEC Chief Economist Jessica Wachter gave the opening remarks. SEC Commissioner Jaime Lizárraga provided remarks on the second day and SEC Commissioner Mark Uyeda delivered the keynote address.
Papers presented at the CFMR 2024:
Anticompetitive Price Referencing Vincent van Kervel (Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile), Bart Zhou Yueshen (Singapore Management University)
A Simple Role for Complex Options Su Li (SEC), David Musto (University of Pennsylvania), Neil Pearson (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
Bloated Disclosures: Can ChatGPT Help Investors Process Information? Alex Kim (University of Chicago), Maximilian Muhn (University of Chicago), Valeri Nikolaev (University of Chicago)
Catering through Transparency: Voluntary ESG Disclosure by Asset Managers and Fund Flows Marco Ceccarelli (VU Amsterdam), Simon Glossner (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System), Mikael Homanen (City University London)
Detecting Informed Trading Risk from Undercutting Activity in Limit Order Markets Yashar Barardehi (Chapman University), Peter Dixon (SEC), Qiyu Liu (SEC)
Detecting the Risk of Cross-Product Manipulation in the EUREX Fixed Income Futures Market Kaveesha Dilshani (University of Technology Sydney), Andy Guo (University of Technology Sydney), Peter Mere (Macquarie University), Alexis Stenfors (University of Portsmouth-UK)
Does High Frequency Market Manipulation Harm Market Quality? Jonathan Brogaard (University of Utah), Dan Li (Chinese University of Hong Kong), Jeffrey Yang (University of Utah)
Does Sustainable Investing Make Stocks Less Sensitive to Information about Cash Flows? Steffen Hitzemann (University of Houston), An Qin (Rutgers University)
Intermediary Balance Sheet Constraints, Bond Mutual Funds’ Strategies, and Bond Returns Mariassunta Giannetti (Stockholm School of Economics), Chotibhak Jotikasthira (Southern Methodist University), Andreas Rapp (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System), Martin Waibel (Stockholm School of Economics)
Learning from DeFi: Would Automated Market Makers Improve Equity Trading? Katya Malinova (McMaster University), Andreas Park (University of Toronto)
Political Uncertainty and Capital Raising Through Private Offerings Vladimir Ivanov (SEC), Matthew Wynter (Stony Brook University)
Spreading Sunshine in Private Equity: Agency Costs and Financial Disintermediation Yingxiang Li (University of British Columbia)
The Dodd-Frank Act and Hedge Fund Operational Risk William Goetzmann (Yale University), Bing Liang (University of Massachusetts), Jue Wang (University of Massachusetts)
Conference Organizers: Kathleen Weiss Hanley (Lehigh University), Amy Edwards (SEC), Vlad Ivanov (SEC), and Russ Wermers (University of Maryland)
10th Annual Conference on Financial Market Regulation (CFMR 2023)
The SEC’s Division of Economic and Risk Analysis (DERA), Lehigh University’s Center for Financial Services (CFS), and University of Maryland’s Center for Financial Policy (CFP) jointly hosted the 10th Annual Conference on Financial Market Regulation (CFMR 2023) on Thursday, May 4 and Friday, May 5, 2023. The goal of the conference is to bring together participants from academia, industry, government, and the SEC for an exchange of views on topics of relevance to the Commission.
Prof. Kathleen Hanley, who has been an organizer for the past decade, welcomed attendees to the CFMR 2023. SEC Chair Gary Gensler gave opening remarks and SEC Chief Economist Jessica Wachter delivered the keynote address.
Papers presented at the CFMR 2023:
Corporate Bond Flipping Stanislava (Stas) Nikolova (University of Nebraska-Lincoln), Liying Wang (University of Nebraska-Lincoln)
Credit Ratings in the Age of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) Ruoke Yang (SEC)
Diversity Washing Andrew Baker (Berkeley Law School), David F. Larcker ((Stanford University), Charles McClure (University of Chicago), Durgesh Saraph (Jump Trading), Edward M. Watts (Yale University)
Do Hedge Funds Strategically Misreport Their Holdings? Evidence from 13F Restatements Sean Cao (University of Maryland), Zhi Da (University of Notre Dame), Xin (Daniel) Jiang (University of Waterloo), Baozhong Yang (Georgia State University)
Money in the Right Hands Aleksandra Rzeźnik (York University), Rüdiger Weber (Vienna University of Economics and Business)
Relationship Discounts in Corporate Bond Trading Simon Jurkatis (Bank of England), Andreas Schrimpf (Aarhus University; Bank for International Settlements), Karamfil Todorov (Bank for International Settlements), Nicholas Vause (Bank of England)
The Incentives of SPAC Sponsors Felix Zhiyu Feng (University of Washington), Tom Nohel (Loyola University of Chicago), Xuan Tian (Tsinghua University), Wenyu Wang (Indiana University), Yufeng Wu (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
The Retail Execution Quality Landscape Anne Haubo Dyhrberg (Wilfrid Laurier University), Andriy Shkilko (Wilfrid Laurier University), Ingrid M. Werner (The Ohio State University)
Tick Sizes and Market Quality: Revisiting the Tick Size Pilot Yashar Barardehi (Chapman University and SEC), Peter Dixon (SEC), Qiyu Liu (SEC), Ariel Lohr (SEC)
Uncovering the Liquidity Premium in Stock Returns Using Retail Liquidity Provision Yashar Barardehi (Chapman University and SEC), Dan Bernhardt (University of Illinois and University of Warwick), Zhi Da (University of Notre Dame), Mitch Warachka (Chapman University)
Would Order-By-Order Auctions Be Competitive? Thomas Ernst (University of Maryland), Chester Spatt (Carnegie Mellon University), Jian Sun (Singapore Management University)
Conference Organizers: Kathleen Weiss Hanley (Lehigh University), Amy Edwards (SEC), Vlad Ivanov (SEC), and Russ Wermers (University of Maryland)
9th Annual Conference on Financial Market Regulation (CFMR 2022)
The SEC’s Division of Economic and Risk Analysis (DERA), Lehigh University’s Center for Financial Services (CFS), University of Maryland’s Center for Financial Policy (CFP), and CFA Institute jointly hosted the virtual CFMR 2022 on Friday, May 6, 2022.
SEC Chief Economist Jessica Wachter welcomed attendees to the CFMR 2022. SEC Chair Gary Gensler gave opening remarks and SEC Commissioner Allison Herren Lee delivered the keynote address.
Papers presented at the CFMR 2022:
Deputization Bruce Carlin (Rice University), Tarik Umar (Rice University), Hanyi (Livia) Yi (Boston College)
Monetary Policy and the Run Risk of Loan Funds Nicola Cetorelli (Federal Reserve Bank of New York), Gabriele La Spada (Federal Reserve Bank of New York), Joao Santos (Federal Reserve Bank of New York)
Squeezing Shorts Through Social Media Platforms Franklin Allen (Imperial College), Marlene Haas (Independent Scholar), Eric Nowak (Universita della Svizzera italiana and Swiss Finance Institute), Matteo Pirovano, (Universita della Svizzera italiana and Swiss Finance Institute), Angel Tengulov (University of Kansas)
The Market Inside the Market: Odd-lot Quotes Robert Bartlett (University of California, Berkeley), Justin McCrary (Columbia University), Maureen O’Hara (Cornell University)
Index Providers: Whales Behind the Scenes of ETFs Yu An (Johns Hopkins University), Matteo Benetton (University of California, Berkeley), Yang Song (University of Washington)
The Consequences of Fund-level Liquidity Requirements Indraneel Chakraborty (University of Miami), Elia Ferracuti (Duke University), John Heater (Duke University), Matthew Phillips (University of Miami)
Does Socially Responsible Investing Change Firm Behavior? Davidson Heath, (University of Utah), Daniele Macciocchi, (University of Miami), Roni Michaely, (University of Hong Kong), Matthew Ringgenberg, (University of Utah)
Everlasting Fraud Vivian Fang (University of Minnesota), Nan Li (University of Minnesota),
Wenyu Wang (Indiana University), Gaoqing Zhang (University of Minnesota)
8th Annual Conference on Financial Market Regulation (CFMR 2021)
SEC Chair Gary Gensler opened the conference. The CFMR 2021 program included remarks by SEC Chief Economist Jessica Wachter, a special session on climate change, and the keynote address was given by SEC Commissioner Caroline Crenshaw.
Papers presented at the CFMR 2021:
Climate Regulatory Risks and Corporate Bonds Lee Seltzer (University of Texas), Laura Starks (University of Texas), and Qifei Zhu (Nanyang Technological University)
Competition and Exchange Data Fees Jonathan Brogaard (University of Utah), James Brugler (University of Melbourne), and Dominik Roesch (University at Buffalo)
Dark Knights: The Rise in Firm Intervention by CDS Investors Andras Danis (Georgia Institute of Technology) and Andrea Gamba (Warwick Business School)
Hedge Fund Liquidity Management: Insights for Systemic Risk Oversight George Aragon (SEC), A. Tolga Ergun (SEC), and Giulio Girardi (EC)
Mutual Fund Fragility, Dealer Liquidity Provisions, and the Pricing of Municipal Bonds Yi Li (Federal Reserve Board), Maureen O'Hara (Cornell University) and Xing (Alex) Zhou (Federal Reserve Board)
Prime Time for Prime Funds: Floating NAV, Intraday Redemptions and Liquidity Risk During Crises Lorenzo Casavecchia (University of Technology Sydney), Chanyuan Ge (Macquarie University), Wei Li (University of Iowa), and Ashish Tiwari (University of Iowa)
Signaling through Carbon Disclosure Patrick Bolton (Columbia University) and Marcin Kacperczyk (Imperial College)
The Anatomy of Trading Algorithms Tyler Beason (Arizona State University) and Sunil Wahal (Arizona State University)
The Design of a Central Counterparty John Kuong (INSEAD) and Vincent Maurin (Stockholm School of Economics)
The Effect of Hidden Liquidity: Evidence from an Exogenous Shock Amy Edwards (SEC), Paul Hughes (SEC), John Ritter (SEC), Patti Vegella (SEC), and Hao Zhang (Rochester Institute of Technology)
The Pricing of New Corporate Debt Issues Kelly Nianyun Cai (University of Michigan Dearborn), Kathleen Weiss Hanley (Lehigh University), Alan Guoming Huang (University of Waterloo), and Xiaofei Zhao (Georgetown University)
The Voting Premium Doron Levit (University of Washington), Nadya Malenko (University of Michigan), and Ernst Maug (University of Mannheim)
7th Annual Conference on Financial Market Regulation (CFMR 2020)
The CFMR 2020 program included a fireside chat with Commissioner Elad Roisman, and a session featuring the SEC division directors who discussed hot topics in their respective areas - Moderator: S.P. Kothari (SEC, Division of Economic and Risk Analysis) Panelists: Dalia Blass (SEC, Division of Investment Management) William Hinman (SEC, Division of Corporation Finance) and Brett Redfearn (SEC, Division of Trading and Markets).
Papers presented at the CFMR 2020:
Discretionary NAVs Scott Cederburg (University of Arizona) and Neal Stoughton (University of Waterloo)
Funding Liquidity and Market Liquidity: the Broker-Dealer Perspective Marco Macchiavelli (Federal Reserve Board) and Xing (Alex) Zhou (Federal Reserve Board)
Periodic Disclosures of Asset-Backed Securities Brent Schmidt (Penn State University) and Helen Zhang (University of Minnesota)
Phantom of the Opera: ETF Shorting and Shareholder Voting Richard Evans (University of Virginia), Oğuzhan Karakaş (University of Cambridge), Rabih Moussawi (Villanova University), and Michael Young (University of Missouri)
Should We Use Closing Prices? Institutional Price Pressure at the Close Vincent Bogousslavsky (Boston College) and Dmitriy Muravyev (Michigan State University)
Sitting Bucks: Zero Returns in Fixed Income Funds Jaewon Choi (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign), Mathias Kronlund (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign), and Jimmy Oh (Hanyang University)
Spinning the CEO Pay Ratio Disclosure Audra Boone (Texas Christian University), Austin Starkweather (Vanderbilt University), and Joshua Tyler White (Vanderbilt University)
Violations of Price-Time Priority and Implications for Market Quality
Seoyoung Kim (Santa Clara University) and Daniel Trepanier (Santa Clara University)
Recording from day 1 of the conference - September 17, 2020.
Recording from day 2 of the conference - September 18, 2020.