Kathleen Weiss Hanley

Kathleen Weiss Hanley joined the faculty in 2015 as the Bolton-Perella Endowed Chair in finance. She is also the director of the Center for Financial Services and the co-director of the Fintech Minor. From 2011 to 2013, she was the deputy chief economist at the Securities and Exchange Commission and the deputy director in the Division of Economic and Risk Analysis where she oversaw the integration of economic analysis into policy and rule-making across a broad range of topics in financial economics including the implementation of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act and the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act. In addition, she managed the division’s research activities, data analytics and risk assessment initiatives. 

Prior to that time, she was a senior economist at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System in the risk analysis section and a senior financial economist at the SEC. She has been on the faculty at the University of Maryland as an associate professor with tenure and at the University of Michigan as an assistant professor. She is a program fellow in the Program of Law and Economics of Capital Markets at Columbia Law School. Professor Hanley is also the executive director of the Financial Economists Roundtable and the incoming executive treasurer and secretary of the American Finance Association.

Professor Hanley currently serves as an editor of the Journal of Accounting and Public Policy and was an editor at the Quarterly Journal of Finance. Her research focuses on capital formation and market pricing and has been published in leading finance journals such as The Journal of Finance, Journal of Financial Economics, The Review of Financial Studies, Journal of Accounting and Economics, and the Journal of Accounting Research.

Education

• Indiana University, B.S.
• University of Florida, Ph.D.

Research Interests

• Corporate finance 
• Regulation 
• Systemic risk 
• Capital markets

• Giulio Girardi, Kathleen Weiss Hanley, Stanislava Nikolova, Lorianna Pelizzon and Mila Getmansky Sherman. 2021. Portfolio Similarity and Asset Liquidation in the Insurance Industry. Journal of Financial Economics 142: 69-96.
• Kathleen Weiss Hanley and Stanislava Nikolova. 2020. Rethinking the Use of Credit Ratings in Capital Regulation. Review of Corporate Finance Studies 10: 347-401.
• Edward, Franklin, Kathleen Weiss Hanley, Robert Litan, and Roman Weil. 2019. Crypto Assets Require Better Regulation: Statement of the Financial Economists Roundtable on Crypto Assets. Financial Analysts Journal 75: 14-19.
• Kathleen Weiss Hanley and Gerard Hoberg, 2019, Dynamic Interpretation of Emerging Risks in the Financial Sector, Review of Financial Studies 32: 4543-4603.
  • Editor's Choice (lead article)
• Hanley, Kathleen Weiss, Alan Jagolinzer and Stanislava Nikolova. 2018. Strategic Reporting of Fair Value Levels. Journal of Accounting and Economics 66: 25-45.
• Chaplinsky, Susan, Kathleen Weiss Hanley and S. Katie Moon. 2017. The JOBS Act and the Costs of Going Public.  Journal of Accounting Research 55: 795-836.
• Caglio, Cecilia, Kathleen Weiss Hanley and Jennifer Marietta-Westberg. 2016. Going Public Abroad. Journal of Corporate Finance 41: 103-122.
• Hanley, Kathleen Weiss, and Gerard Hoberg. 2012. Litigation Risk, Strategic Disclosure and the Underpricing of Initial Public Offerings. Journal of Financial Economics 103: 235-254.
• Edwards, Amy, and Kathleen Weiss Hanley. 2010. Short Selling in Initial Public Offerings. Journal of Financial Economics 98: 21-39.
• Hanley, Kathleen Weiss, and Gerard Hoberg. 2010. The Information Content of IPO Prospectuses. Review of Financial Studies 23: 2821-2864.
• Hanley, Kathleen Weiss, Charles MC Lee, and Paul Seguin. 1996. The Marketing of Closed-end Fund IPOs: Evidence from Transactions Data. Journal of Financial Intermediation 5: 127-159.
• Hanley, Kathleen Weiss, and Jr. William Wilhelm. 1995. Evidence on the Strategic Allocation of Initial Public Offerings. Journal of Financial Economics 37: 239-257.
• Hanley, Kathleen Weiss, Arun Kumar, and Paul Seguin. 1993. Price Stabilization in the Market for New Issues. Journal of Financial Economics 34: 177-197.
• Hanley, Kathleen Weiss. 1993. The Underpricing of Initial Public Offerings and the Partial Adjustment Phenomenon. Journal of Financial Economics 34: 231-250.
• Megginson, William, and Kathleen Weiss. 1991. Venture Capitalist Certification in Initial Public Offerings. Journal of Finance 46: 879-903.
• Weiss, Kathleen. 1989. The Post-Offering Price Performance of Closed-End Funds. Financial Management 18: 57-67.
• Smith, Stephen, Deborah Wright Gregory, and Kathleen Weiss. 1987. A Note on Quantity Versus Price Risk and the Theory of Financial Intermediation. Journal of Finance 42: 1377-1383.

Working Papers

• Aleksandra Rzeznik, Kathleen Weiss Hanley, and Lorianna Pelizzon. Investor Reliance on ESG Ratings and Stock Price Performance.
• Scott Bauguess, Jack Cooney, and Kathleen Weiss Hanley. The Demand For Information in Newly Issued Securities.
• Kelly Nianyun Cai, Kathleen Weiss Hanley, Alan Guoming Huang and Xiaofei Zhao, The Pricing of New Corporate Debt Issues.
• Reena Aggarwal, Kathleen Weiss Hanley, and Xiaofei Zhao, The Role of “Expert Reviewers” in Private Capital Markets.

NSF Grant

• Highlights
• Hanley and Hoberg Data Library

Kathleen Weiss Hanley and Gerard Hoberg. Dynamic Interpretation of Emerging Risks in the Financial Sector. forthcoming Review of Financial Studies.

OFR/NSF Grant EAGER: III: CIFRAM: Dynamic Identification and Interpretation of Emerging Systemic Risks Using Textual Analysis (Gerard Hoberg, University of Southern California)

We use computational linguistics to develop a dynamic, interpretable methodology that can detect emerging risks in the financial sector. Our model can predict heightened risk exposures as early as mid-2005, well in advance of the 2008 financial crisis. Risks related to real estate, prepayment, and commercial paper are elevated. Individual bank exposure strongly predicts returns, bank failure and return volatility. We also document a rise in market instability since 2014 related to sources of funding and mergers and acquisitions. Overall, our model predicts the build-up of emerging risk in the financial system and bank-specific exposures in a timely fashion.