I’m pleased to announce that Zhi Da, Howard J. and Geraldine F. Korth Professor of Finance, will give the next University Chair Lecture on March 24. His talk will start at 3 p.m. in Stayer Commons A and will be followed by a reception from 4-5:30 p.m. in Stayer Commons B. 

Launched in fall 2023, the University Chair Public Lecture Series honors the exceptional research contributions of our faculty. This distinguished lecture series recognizes University chairs — Notre Dame's most prestigious acknowledgment of faculty achievement.

Zhi will present "The Role of Investor Attention in the Financial Market." His research focuses on empirical asset pricing and investment, with recent papers examining trading innovations and studying the behaviors of retail investors, institutions, equity analysts and corporate executives. His research has been cited more than 11,000 times, with his 2011 paper “In Search of Attention” (published in the Journal of Finance) receiving more than 3,800 citations. The paper proposed a new measure of retail investor attention using search frequency in Google.

His many awards include the James Dincolo Outstanding Research Award in the Department of Finance (2023), the University of Notre Dame Luksic Scholars Research Award (2023), the CIRF/CFRI – Global Association of Risk Professionals Research Award (2020) and the Midwest Finance Association Outstanding Paper (2019). Zhi also received competitive research grants from Moody’s KMV and Morgan Stanley. He teaches an elective course on fixed income securities. 

After gaining a BBA and an MSc from the National University of Singapore, Zhi worked at the interest rate and exotic derivative trading desk in DBS Bank. He subsequently earned a Ph.D. in Finance from Northwestern University.

The University Chair Lecture will also feature Zhi’s doctoral advisor, Ravi Jagannathan, the CME Group/John F. Sandner Chair of Finance at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management and co-director of the Financial Institutions and Markets Research Center at the Kellogg School. Ravi Jagannathan will introduce Zhi.

The University Chair Lectures are unique opportunities for faculty and staff to gain insights into your colleagues’ groundbreaking academic research and the intellectual work shaping our understanding of business. They also are occasions to celebrate together the scholarly accomplishments of our faculty.

I hope you will be able to attend.

In Notre Dame,

Martijn

Martijn Cremers
Martin J. Gillen Dean
Bernard J. Hank Professor of Finance