Education

Ph.D., Economics, Cornell University, 2011
M.A., Economics, University of British Columbia, 2004
M.A., Finance, Renmin University of China, 2002
B.A., Accounting, Southeast University, China, 1999

Employment and Positions Held

Assistant Professor of Finance, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2011- present
Beckman Fellow, Center for Advanced Study, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2013
Trustee, Cornell Board of Trustees, 2006-2008

Research Interests

Market Microstructure, Big Data

Publications

1. What’s Not There: Odd Lots and Market Data, with Maureen O’Hara and Chen Yao,  Journal of Finance, 69, 2014, 2199–2236
   • Media coverage in Washington Post, Bloomberg news (three times), Businessweek, Trader’s Magazine
   • Lead to the policy change in trade report requirement in the United States starting from December 9, 2013
2. Is Market Fragmentation Harming Market Quality?, with Maureen O’Hara,  Journal of Financial Economics, 100, 2011, 459-474. Lead article.

Working Papers

1. Why Trading Speed Matters: A Tale of Queue Rationing under Price Controls, with Chen Yao
   • Revise and resubmit to the Review of Financial Studies
   • 2015 Utah Winter Finance Conference, 2015 WFA Annual Meeting

Presentation at Utah Winter Finance Conference, Feb 2015

2. What Drives Price Dispersion and Market Fragmentation across U.S. Stock Exchanges?, with Yong Chao and Chen Yao
   • Solicited by the Review of Financial Studies
   • 2016 Utah Winter Finance Conference, 2016 Texas Finance Festival, 2016 Stern Microstructure Meeting

Presentation at Utah Winter Finance Conference, Feb 2016

3. Sparse Signals in the Cross-Section of Returns, with Alex Chinco and Adam Clark-Joseph
   • Revise and resubmit to the Journal of Finance
   • 2016 AFA Annual Meeting

4. Designated Market Makers Still Matter: Evidence from Two Natural Experiments, with Adam Clark-Joseph and Chao Zi
   • Revise and resubmit to the Journal of Financial Economics
   • 2016 WFA Annual Meeting

5. Investment-Horizon Spillovers: Evidence From Decomposing Trading-Volume Variance, with Alex Chinco
   • 2015 FRA Annual Meeting

6. The Externalities of High Frequency Trading, with Jiading Gai and Chen Yao
   • 2013 AFA Annual Meeting
   • Cited in U.S. Senate testimony on computerized trading, September 20, 2012
   • Media coverage in Institutional Investor magazine and Quartz

7. Catching fire: An Intraday Analysis of Information Diffusion Using Retweet Data, with Zhi Da, Nitish. Chawla, Jian Xu

8. Tick Size Constraints, Market Structure, and Liquidity, with Chen Yao

9. A Glimpse into the Dark: Price Formation, Transaction Cost and Market Share of the Crossing Network

10. Non-Execution and Market Share of Crossing Networks

Teaching Experience

FIN 511: Portfolio Management (Professional MBA)
• Winner of Professional MBA Teaching Excellence Award
• List of Teachers Ranked as Outstanding

FIN 411: Portfolio Management (undergraduate)
• Most Recent Course Evaluation (5.0/5.0)
• List of Teachers Ranked as Outstanding

Work Experience

2006-2008      Trustee, Board of Trustees, Cornell University
2006-2008      Columnist, Cornell Daily Sun    

External Research Grant and Fellowship

National Science Foundation grant: $255,851, Principal Investigator, joint with Robert Sinkovits from San Diego Supercomputing Center

National Science Foundation’s XSEDE (Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment) program

• Pittsburg Supercomputer Center: 1,250,000 Service Units from Blacklight supercomputer and Staff support from Anirban Jana and David O’Neal
• San Diego Supercomputer Center: 2,000,000 service units from Gordon supercomputer and staff support from Robert Sinkovits and

NASDAQ OMX Education Foundation, 2009-2010, $15,000 for “Price Discovery and Liquidity in a Fragmented Stock Market”

Services

Ad-hoc Referee: Quarterly Journal of Economics, Journal of Finance, Review of Financial Studies, Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Management Science, Journal of Financial Markets, Review of Finance, Journal of Financial Intermediation, Journal of Empirical Finance, Quantitative Finance

Conference:  Session Chair for American Finance Association Annual Meeting 2017

Grant/Proposal Reviewer:  United Kingdom Government Office for Science, Hong Kong Research Grants Council

Ph.D. Dissertation Committee:  
Dmitriy Muravyev (Initial Placement: Boston College)
Jaehoon Lee (Initial Placement: University of New South Wales)
Chen Yao (Co-chair of the committee, Initial Placement: University of Warwick)

Selected Honors and Awards

2016: Educator of the Year, University of Illinois

2015: List of Teachers Ranked as Outstanding for Undergraduate Teaching

2015: Professional MBA Teaching Excellence Award

2013: HPCwire Editor’s Choice Award for best use of high performance computing in financial services

2013: Beckman Fellow, Center for Advanced Studies, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

2013: Domain Champion in Economics, National Science Foundation’s XSEDE program

2013: Best paper award,  Mid-Atlantic Research Conference in Finance

2005-2010: Sage Fellowship, Cornell University

2008: American Finance Association travel grant

2007: Speaker for 142^nd New Student Convocation at Cornell University:  invited to deliver the welcome speech to 3,500 new students and their parents on behalf of all Cornell students

Presentations and Discussions

2017: American Economic Association

2016: Utah Winter Finance Conference, Texas Finance Festival, AFA, WFA, NYU Stern Market Microstructure Conference

2015: Harvard Business School and Harvard Department of Economics, Utah Winter Finance Conference, WFA, Finance Research Association Annual Meeting, SFS Cavalcade, NYU Stern Market Microstructure Meeting, Washington University at St. Louis, FIRS,  HEC Lausanne, EPFL, University of Illinois (Economics), University of Notre Dame, Conference on Current Topics in Financial Regulation

2014: AFA, Midway Market Design Workshop at Chicago Booth, University of Notre Dame, HEC Paris,  City University of New York, Baruch College, Paris Hedge Fund Conference, University of Illinois, FMA, JP Morgan, IEX Stock Exchange, Office of Financial Research at U.S. Department of Treasury, Conference on Market Fragmentation, Fragility and Fees at University of Maryland and FINRA

2013: AFA, NBER, SEC, CFTC/American University, Michigan State University Conference on Investments and Financial Institutions, University of Illinois, FIRS, CICF, FMA, Mid-Atlantic Research Conference in Finance

2012: AFA, NBER, SFS Cavalcade, University of Toronto, University of Memphis, Annual Central Bank Workshop on Market Microstructure, EFA, FMA

2011: WFA, NBER, Vienna Graduate School of Finance, Syracuse University, Goldman Sachs, NASDAQ and State University of New York at Buffalo

2010: University of Illinois, University of Utah, Southern Methodist University and Barclays Capital

2009: Cornell University Johnson School of Management

References

Professor David Easley (Chair) 450 Uris Hall, Department of Economics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853 607-255-6283 dae3@cornell.edu

Professor Maureen O’Hara (Co-chair) 447 Sage Hall, Johnson Graduate School of Management, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853 607-255-3645 mo19@cornell.edu

Professor Gideon Saar 455 Sage Hall, Johnson Graduate School of Management, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853 607-255-7484 gs25@cornell.edu