Arman Eshraghi

Background

Arman Eshraghi holds the Chair of Finance and Investment at Cardiff Business School. He is a Shimomura Fellow of the Development Bank of Japan, Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy and the Centre for Study of Decision-Making Uncertainty at UCL. At Cardiff, Arman directs the Fintech Research Group, and serves as Deputy Head of Section for Research, Impact and Innovation.

Formerly, Arman was at the University of Edinburgh, and has held visiting positions at the University of Manchester and University College London. Prior to academia, he was a management consultant in the banking and telecom sectors. Arman holds PhD in Finance from the University of Edinburgh, MBA with a finance concentration and BSc in Electrical Engineering, both from Sharif University in Tehran. His doctoral and post-doctoral research was highly commended by EFMD Global, Emerald Literati, SFE Rising Star, and EFG Young Scholar awards.

Research

Arman’s academic research spans finance, accounting and psychology with broad interests including investment management, behavioural finance, financial technology, corporate governance, and critical accounting. Inter alia, his work is cited in the Financial Times, Washington Post, Harvard Business Review, Forbes, Bloomberg and the BBC, and has contributed to handbooks published by Cambridge University, Wiley, Springer and Routledge.

His journal publications cover finance (Review of Financial Studies; Review of Finance; European Financial Management; Financial Review; Corporate Governance: An International Review; International Review of Financial Analysis; Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting; Finance Research Letters), accounting (Accounting, Organizations and Society; Accounting, Auditing and Accountability; Accounting and Business Research) and management (British Journal of Management). Arman also actively contributes to editing finance journals as Co-Editor of International Review of Economics and Finance, Senior Editor of Finance Research Letters and the Global Finance Journal, and Special Issue Co-Editor of the European Journal of Finance. He has conducted paper reviews for the Journal of Corporate Finance; Journal of Banking and Finance; European Financial Management; Journal of Business Ethics; and Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization.

Beyond academia, Prof. Eshraghi engages with a range of organisations in the finance sector to offer bespoke research and training. He has given invited talks, among others, at the Federal Reserve Bank (New York), Centre for European Economic Research (Mannheim), National Institute of Securities Markets (Mumbai), and UK organisations such as the ONS, CFA UK Institute and CityUK. Arman sits on the Advisory Board of Fintech Wales, has advised a number of UK-based firms in the area of financial markets, and is a mentor at Fintech Wales Foundry.

Teaching

Arman is also highly passionate about teaching and education. Beyond Cardiff, he has taught diverse cohorts in the UK (Edinburgh, London, Manchester, Warwick), Europe (Belgium, Denmark, Netherland, Portugal) and Asia (China, India, Thailand). He is currently an external examiner of MSc Banking and International Finance at Bayes (formerly, Cass) Business School at City, University of London.

Typically, Arman’s teaching includes MSc, MBA, PhD and executive courses in investment management, behavioural finance, corporate finance and fintech (a full list is available on the teaching tab above). He is passionate about teaching innovations, and his courses have won awards voted by students for Best Teaching Innovation, Best Postgraduate Course and Inspirational Teaching.

Research Interests

• Behavioural investing, fund management, behavioural corporate finance
• Financial technology, big data, textual analysis in finance
• Corporate governance, board structure, governance in banking
• Interdisciplinary and critical accounting, discourse analysis, sensemaking

Honours and awards

Research

• Best Academic Programme finalist, Fintech Wales Awards, 2021
• Scottish Crucible Fellowship, 2018
• Shimomura Fellowship, Development Bank of Japan, 2018
• Sustained Excellence Award, University of Edinburgh, 2017
• Finalist, Scottish Financial Enterprise Rising Star Award sponsored by EY, 2017
• Best Paper Award Finalist, Financial Management Association European Conference, Venice, 2015
• Best Paper Award, International Review of Financial Analysis Conference on Gold, 2015
• Best Paper Award (twice), Behavioural Finance Working Group Conference, London, 2014-15
• Highly Commended PhD Research, European Foundation for Management Development, 2014
• Young Scholar Award for Research in Financial Discourse, European Financial Group, 2014
• Highly Commended, Emerald Literati Award for Research Excellence, 2013

Teaching

• Best Teaching Innovation Award, University of Edinburgh Business School, 2017
• Selected in the University of Edinburgh Teaching Excellence Poster Campaign, 2017-18
• Best Course Award, University of Edinburgh Business School, 2016
• Inspirational Teaching Award, University of Edinburgh Business School, 2015
• Nominated 14 times, University of Edinburgh Annual Teaching Awards, 2012-18
• Best Postgraduate Tutor, Manchester Business School, 2010

Pre-academia

• PhD scholarship at the University of Edinburgh, 2007-11
• Third rank in the MBA graduating class of Iran’s most selective business school, 2005
• First rank in Iran's National Admissions Test for postgraduate business programmes, 2003
• Admitted to Iran’s most selective (top 0.02%) engineering programme, 1999

Professional memberships

• Director, Cardiff Corporate Governance Research Group, Cardiff University
• Co-director, Cardiff Fintech Research Group, Cardiff University
• Fellow, Centre for Study of Decision-Making Uncertainty, UCL
• Fellow, Development Bank of Japan
• Fellow, Higher Education Academy
• Former Member, Edinburgh Futures Institute, University of Edinburgh
• Former Member, Academic Senate, University of Edinburgh

Academic positions

• Professor of Finance and Investment, Cardiff University, 2018-present
• Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in Finance and Accounting, University of Edinburgh, 2016-18
• Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Finance and Accounting, University of Edinburgh, 2013-16
• Postdoctoral Fellow in Finance, University of Edinburgh, 2011-13
• Visiting Doctoral Fellow, University of Manchester, 2010-11
• Visiting Doctoral Fellow, University College London, 2008-09