Research Paper Competition & Awards
Weinberg Center / IRRCi Research Paper Competition
This research competition is the successor to the IRRCi Investor Research Paper Award, which had become a prominent award garnering significant attention amongst the investment community, academia and policymakers. The John L. Weinberg/IRRCi Research Paper Award, as its predecessor did, highlights innovative research.
Research Paper Winners
2025 Corporate Governance Symposium
The Weinberg Center, in collaboration with the European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI), hosted its annual IRRCi corporate governance symposium on campus on Friday, March 15, 2025.
The winners of the 2025 Weinberg/IRRCi $10,000 Research Paper Award competition were announced during the dinner reception on Friday evening at Newark Country Club.
The winning papers are:
- “Custom Proxy Voting Advice” by Edwin Hu (Virginia), Nadya Malenko (Boston College) and Jonathon Zytnick (Georgetown; presenter)
- “Voting on Public Goods: Citizens versus Shareholders” by Robin Döttling (Erasmus), Doron Levit (Washington; presenter), Nadya Melenko (Boston College), Magdalena Rola-Janicka (Imperial)
The other 10 papers selected from nearly 100 submissions were also presented during the day-long symposium at Clayton Hall (View PDF). Providing remarks over the two-day event were Lerner College Dean Oliver Yao and Weinberg Center Director Lawrence Cunningham. Hosting the event were UD Finance Professors Laura Field and Fei Xie, Chair and Vice Chair of the Department, respectively.
Left to right: Xie, Cunningham, Levit, Zytnick, Field
2024 Research paper competition winners
The three John L. Weinberg/IRRCi research paper competition winners were announced at the 2024 Corporate Governance Symposium on March 17, 2023. The other eight finalist papers were also presented.
Congratulations to the winning papers:
- Do board connections between product market peers impede competition?
Authors: Radhakrishnan Gopalan (Washington University in St. Louis, deceased), Renping Li (Washington University in St. Louis), Alminas Zaldoka (National University of Singapore)
Read the Paper - The Social Cost of Liquidity Disclosure: Evidence from Hospitals
Authors: Thomas Bourveau (Columbia University), Xavier Giroud (Columbia University, Yifan Ji (University of South Carolina), Xuelin Li (Columbia University)
Read the Paper - Specialist Directors|
Authors: Yaron Nili (University of Wisconsin Law School) and Roy Shapira (Reichman University)
Read the Paper
Read more about the 2024 Symposium and the papers on the 2024 Corporate Governance Symposium Event page
Congratulations to the winning papers:
• “Female Equity Analysts and Corporate Environmental and Social Performance”
Authors: Kai Li (University of British Columbia), Feng Mai (Stevens Institute of Technology), Gabriel Wong (Cardiff University), Chelsea Yang (University of British Columbia), and Tengfei Zhang (Rutgers University)
• “Conflicting Fiduciary Duties and Fire Sales of VC-backed Start-ups”
Bo Bian (University of British Columbia), Yingxiang Li (University of British Columbia), and Casimiro A. Nigro (Goethe University)
Read more about the 2023 Symposium and the papers HERE.
Research paper competition winners announced March 2022 at the virtual Symposium
John L. Weinberg/IRRCi research paper competition winners were announced at the 2022 virtual Symposium on March 11, 2022. The six other finalist papers were also presented.
Congratulations to the winning papers:
- Is History Repeating Itself? The (Un)predictable Past of ESG Ratings
Florian Berg (MIT), Kornelia Fabisik (Frankfurt), and Zacharias Sautner (Frankfurt) - Bargaining with Private Equity: Implications for Hospital Prices and Patient Welfare
Tong Liu (Wharton)
Read more about the 2022 Symposium and the papers.
2020-2021 Research Paper Award Competition
Research paper competition winners to be presented at the virtual 2021 Symposium on March 16, 2021
John L. Weinberg/IRRCi research paper competition winners were presented at the 2021 virtual Symposium on March 16, 2021.The six finalist papers were also presented.
Congratulations to the winning papers:
- The ESG-Innovation Disconnect: Evidence from Green Patenting
Lauren Cohen (Harvard & NBER) (Presenter), Umit Gurun (UT Dallas) and Quoc Nguyen (DePaul U.)
- The Distribution of Voting Rights to Shareholders
Vyacheslav Fos (Boston College) (Presenter), Cliff Holderness (Boston College)
Read more about the Symposium
Virtual 2021 Corporate Governance Symposium – Academic Portion
Tuesday, March 16, 2021 / 9:45 am to 3:00 pm
2019-2020 Research Paper Award Competition
Weinberg Center Announces Winners of the John L. Weinberg/IRRCi Research Paper Award
John L. Weinberg/IRRCi research paper winners will be presented at the 2020 Symposium on March 17, 2020.
The winning papers are:
- “Does Revlon Matter? An Empirical and Theoretical Study” by Matthew D. Cain, Berkeley Center for Law and Business; Sean J. Griffith, Fordham Law School (Presenter); Robert J. Jackson, Jr., New York University School of Law; Steven Davidoff Solomon, University of California, Berkeley, School of Law
- “Corporate Culture: Evidence from the Field” by John R. Graham, Duke University & NBER; Jillian Grennan, Duke University (Presenter); Campbell R. Harvey, Duke University & NBER; Shivaram Rajgopal, Columbia University
Read more about the upcoming Symposium.
2020 Corporate Governance Symposium
“Critical Issues for Boards and Investors in 2020″John L. Weinberg/IRRCi Investor
Tuesday, March 17, 2020 / 8:00 am to 5:00 pm
Clayton Hall, University of Delaware
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