On February 19, the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) Institute announced the winners of the 2024 Graham & Dodd Awards of Excellence. You Haifeng—a CFA charterholder who serves as professor at the Tsinghua Shenzhen International Graduate School’s Institute of Innovation Management and Chair Professor of Accounting at Tsinghua University’s School of Economics and Management—along with independent researcher Cao Kai, received the top honor for their paper Fundamental Analysis via Machine Learning, published in the Financial Analysts Journal.
Fundamental Analysis via Machine Learning received the Top Award of 2024 Graham & Dodd Awards
The research explores the integration of machine learning techniques into fundamental analysis, providing insights into how these methods can enhance investment decision making by more effectively extracting and utilizing information from financial statements. The authors found that machine learning can play a transformative role in enhancing the accuracy and efficacy of earnings forecasts, adding significant predictive power with respect to future stock returns. This superior performance appears attributable to the ability of machine learning to uncover new information through identifying economically significant predictors and capturing nonlinear relationships. The judging panel highlighted the article's relevance and potential to bridge traditional financial analysis with cutting-edge technology, making it highly valuable for CFA Institute members, practitioners, and academics alike.
Each year, Financial Analysts Journal selects from the research articles published in the journal that year to receive the prestigious Graham & Dodd Awards of Excellence, recognizing the contributions of the research to the practice of investment management. The awards are named after Benjamin Graham and David L. Dodd to honor their enduring contributions to the field of financial analysis. A maximum of three awards are given: a Top Award recognizing the best research article and up to two Scroll Awards acknowledging the best runner-up article (s).
You Haifeng is a Professor at Tsinghua Shenzhen International Graduate School and serves as Chair Professor and Co-Director of the Department of Accounting at Tsinghua University's School of Economics and Management. His research bridges academia and industry, focusing on artificial intelligence in finance and accounting, and the relationship between capital markets and the real economy. His work has appeared in leading academic journals such as The Accounting Review, Journal of Accounting Research, and Journal of Financial Economics.
Prior to joining Tsinghua University, Professor You was a tenured Professor of Accounting and Director of the Center for Securities Analysis with Financial Technology at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST). His professional experience includes positions at leading financial institutions such as China Investment Corporation and Barclays Global Investors (now BlackRock). He has also collaborated with GSA Capital, Bosera Funds, and Datayes to advance financial technology innovation and its practical applications in investment management.
Source: CFA Institute
Edited by Peng Bin & Huang Xiaojia
Reviewed by Nie Xiaomei
