Sustainability Risk (Research Project)

Course goals

Learning objectives
At the end of the course, the student is able to:

• Assess the contribution of pivotal research papers in sustainable finance;
• Formulate a relevant research question;
• Specify an empirical research design to answer the research question;
• Apply empirical research methods.

Content

This course encourages students to critically evaluate latest research into sustainability risks that are of potentially high importance to regulators, investors, and companies. The course has the dual objective of (i) expanding students’ fundamental knowledge in the domain of sustainable finance, and (ii) further strengthening the research skills students need to complete their Master’s thesis.

Students become familiar with various sustainability-related risks, which are frequently mentioned in financial practice and raise important questions for research. Students critically evaluate state-of-the-art empirical research papers with a focus on their empirical strategy to identify the effect of sustainability risks on assets and markets.

Based on the gap students identify in the literature, students develop an original research question in the field of sustainable finance and develop well-motivated hypotheses. Next, students work on improving their empirical research skills by executing their research proposal. The skills that are relevant here include data collection and processing data, using appropriate software, as well as properly writing up the data, methodology and results sections.

Format
Plenary lectures and presentations.