European Finance Association Minutes of the EFA General Assembly 2010 Frankfurt, Germany 27 th August 2010 The 2010 European Finance Association General Assembly was held on Friday afternoon August 27 th at the conference venue in Frankfurt, chaired by Kristian R. Miltersen, EFA President 2010. An announcement of this annual meeting of the membership had previously been distributed electronically to all current EFA members who were duly invited to attend the 2010 General Assembly. Approximately 60 EFA members were in attendance, including the new Chair, Pradeep Yadav, the Vice President, Jan Krahnen, and several other members of the EFA Executive Committee. The President called the meeting to order at 5:15 p.m. by welcoming all of the European Finance Association members attending the 37 th EFA Annual Meeting in Frankfurt, Germany and thanked those who were present at the General Assembly for their participation. There were several important items on the Agenda which needed to be approved by EFA members in 2010. AGENDA 1. Approval of the 2009 General Assembly Minutes 2. Approval of the 2009 Accounts 3. President s Report Report on the Review of Finance Report on the revised EFA Statutes 4. Elections 2011 EFA President EFA Vice President EFA Chairperson (2011-2013) 5. Future Conferences 6. Questions & Answers 7. Awards Presentation The President reviewed the meeting Agenda and asked if there were any more items to add. There were none. He announced that the EFA 2010 best paper awards would not be presented during the General Assembly as originally planned, but instead the honours would be done during the Gala Dinner tonight. President Miltersen then asked for a motion to approve the 2010 GA Agenda. The 2010 EFA General Assembly Agenda was officially approved. EFA General Assembly Minutes Frankfurt, Germany 27 th August 2010 Page 1
The President expressed his admiration for the organisation and the quality of papers at the 37 th Annual Meeting of the European Finance Association currently being held in Frankfurt. He congratulated the efforts of Conference Chair, Prof. Jan Pieter Krahnen, and his wonderful team, headed by Ms. Sabine Kimmel, who have been responsible for making this year s event such a success. A grand total of 1,364 submissions (representing 51 countries) were received, and at least 2 reviewers were assigned to each paper; 351 reviewers prepared over 3,000 reviews; 218 papers (representing 25 countries were accepted. At the last count, there are 639 delegates attending the conference. More than 350 will be at the conference dinner (they had to stop selling tickets due to space restrictions). 1. APPROVAL OF THE 2009 GENERAL ASSEMBLY MINUTES The President mentioned that the Minutes of the last General Assembly held in Bergen were readily available on the EFA association website (http://www.efa-online.org) for all members and the general public to read, and that the link had been previously distributed along with the invitation to the 2010 EFA General Assembly. He then asked for a motion to approve the 2009 Minutes. The 2009 General Assembly Minutes were unanimously approved. 2. APPROVAL OF THE 2009 ACCOUNTS President Miltersen moved on to the Accounts 2009 and the slides covering Income, Expenditures and the Balance Sheet. The Accounts 2009 had already been duly circulated electronically to current EFA members prior to the 2010 General Assembly by the Executive Secretary. The President mentioned that EFA was in decent financial shape, and reviewed the new fee structure including the breakdown of submission fees between the conference and the association. He pointed out that EFA membership is now for the current year, whereas prior to the move to a submission-based membership, it was for the next year (i.e., the calendar year following the Annual Meeting). However, due to increasing costs and a larger membership base, the annual dues may need to be raised slightly but every attempt would be made to keep them as low as possible. All EFA memberships are for the calendar year and include a personal (print and online) subscription to the association s quarterly journal, Review of Finance. The President asked for a motion to approve the 2009 Accounts. The EFA Accounts for 2009 were unanimously approved. 3. PRESIDENT S REPORT REPORT ON THE REVIEW OF FINANCE The President asked Josef Zechner of the Vienna University of Economics and Business to give an update on EFA s journal, the Review of Finance. Josef gave highlights from the report prepared by Marco Pagano and himself, which was recently presented to the Executive Committee. In May 2010 there has been a substantial restructuring and rejuvenation of the Editorial Board of the Review of Finance: with the appointment of twelve new associate editors. From 1 July 2009 to 30 June 2010, there have been 291 submissions, with a increase relative to the 234 submissions in the previous year. The acceptance rate has decreased to 10.3%, down from 13.3% last year, and the fraction of papers accepted for resubmission has remained nearly constant at 25.1% (to be compared with 25.5% last year). The speed of the editorial process has increased compared to last year. Notably, fast-track submissions have become considerably more popular than last year: they received 43 new fast-track submissions (including fast-track resubmissions), up from 23 in 2008/09 and 31 in 2007/08 an increase. Still, they managed not to miss a single deadline for these submissions! A key element to strengthen the competitive position of the Review of Finance relative to other finance journals is to increase the flow of submissions of young faculty striving for tenure or promotions in top business schools. Two of the journal s advisory editors recently sent a letter to LBS and INSEAD asking them to assign a large weight to articles published in the RoF in tenure and promotion decisions. In EFA General Assembly Minutes Frankfurt, Germany 27 th August 2010 Page 2
response, on May 10, 2010 the finance faculty of INSEAD wrote a letter strongly supporting such a policy: the letter is currently posted on the journal s web site (www.revfin.org). They hope to get an equally public and strong support by LBS and other top European and U.S. business schools. Impact factors are generally recognized as a measure of the competitive position of journals. Based on several criteria, the Review of Finance comes out as number 5. The Journal of Financial Intermediation is ahead of the Review of Finance, but that journal is not a broad field journal. On those dimensions, the Review of Finance clearly beats the Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis and the Journal of Banking and Finance. These data suggests that the Review of Finance is at the top of the group of journals immediately behind the top three that is, it is effectively in 4 th place. Prof. Zechner ended his report by appealing to the EFA membership for support in helping to raise the profile of EFA s journal. The President thanked Josef and expressed EFA s gratitude to the Editors of the Review of Finance for their hard work over the years in ensuring that EFA s journal gets to the top! PROPOSED CHANGES TO THE EFA STATUTES The President reviewed the recent revisions to the EFA Statutes, and thanked the EFA membership and the Executive Committee for their support, and in particular Bruno Gérard for his tireless efforts over the past year in this regard. The Statutes were duly notarised, filed and published earlier this year. Due to the new governance bylaws and especially the new Chair position (a 3-year mandate), EFA can now ensure continuity over the years, among other advantages. Furthermore, the new Statutes allow for electronic voting by the EFA membership, and reduce the quorum numbers required for EFA General Assembly votes / decisions these provisions help to iron out some previous inconsistencies and better harmonize the provisions of the EFA bylaws. As of the calendar year 2010, EFA is operating according to the newly revised Statutes. Thanks to EFA members for participating in this legal process last year by voicing their comments and by voting! 4. ELECTIONS 2011 President Kristian Miltersen reviewed the composition of the Executive Committee, introducing all of the Officers and Directors, and at the same time welcoming the newly-elected Directors as of January 2010: Peter Bossaerts, Thierry Foucault, and Loriana Pelizzon. He also announced that this would be the last General Assembly meeting as Directors for those whose mandates will finish at the end of this year: Elroy Dimson, Miguel A. Ferreira and Ingrid M. Werner. On behalf of EFA, the President thanked them for their participation and contribution. He also officially thanked all of the 2010 Executive Committee members for their hard work and support throughout the year. The President moved on to the 2011 EFA Elections. He reported that the Executive Committee during its meeting on 25 th August 2010 had unanimously agreed to nominate the Conference Chair of EFA 2010, Jan P. Krahnen, as the EFA President 2011 and was asking for the formal approval of the EFA membership. The nomination of the next EFA President, Jan P. Krahnen, was unanimously approved and applauded by the EFA General Assembly 2010. The President announced that, at the same meeting as above, the EFA Executive Committee had agreed unanimously to nominate the Conference Chair of EFA 2011, Ingrid M. Werner, as the EFA Vice President 2011 and was again seeking the formal approval of the EFA membership. The nomination of the next EFA Vice President, Ingrid M. Werner, was unanimously approved and applauded by the EFA General Assembly 2010. The President then announced that, new as of this year and at the same meeting as above, the EFA Executive Committee had agreed unanimously to nominate Pradeep Yadav as the first EFA Chair (2011-2013) and was now seeking the formal approval of the EFA membership. EFA General Assembly Minutes Frankfurt, Germany 27 th August 2010 Page 3
The nomination of the first EFA Chair, Pradeep Yadav, was unanimously approved and applauded by the EFA General Assembly 2010. On behalf of the Chair of the 2011 EFA Elections Nominating Committee, Maria Vassalou (who due to a last-minute conflict was unable to be here), the President reported that 5 candidates have agreed to stand for election for 3 Director posts which will be available on the 2011 EFA Executive Committee: Dennis GROMB INSEAD Ernst MAUG University of Mannheim Ludovic PHALIPPOU University of Amsterdam Luis VICEIRA Harvard Business School Paolo VOLPIN London Business School The election will take place this fall, and electronic ballots will be delivered by e-mail. Note that only current EFA members are eligible to vote and will thus receive a ballot. The 3-year mandates of the new Directors will begin on January 1, 2011. Don t forget to cast your votes they really count! 5. FUTURE CONFERENCES President Miltersen reminded the General Assembly that next year s conference (the 38 th EFA Annual Meeting) will be held in Stockholm, Sweden. The Conference Chair is Ingrid M. Werner (Ohio State University), with Co-Chairs Mike Burkart (Stockholm School of Economics SSE) and Per Strömberg (SSE & The Institute for Financial Research SIFR).. The dates for EFA 2011 are 17-20 August. The paper submission deadline will again be 15 February. The conference website is: www.efa2011.org. 6. QUESTIONS & ANSWERS The President asked whether there were any questions or comments from the audience. As there were none, he adjourned the General Assembly and proceeded to outline the Awards Presentation. 7. AWARDS PRESENTATION The President was confident that the 2010 EFA Annual Meeting is appealing to the intellectual tastes of European and international delegates alike. He thanked all delegates for their active participation. He also thanked the conference sponsors and exhibitors for their kind support of EFA 2010. President Miltersen gave a brief background on the tradition of honouring Past EFA Presidents and announced that three commemorative plaques would be presented at this year s Gala Dinner: 2009 Maria Vassalou [presented by Kristian R. Miltersen] 2008 Arnoud Boot [presented by Pradeep Yadav] 1989 N. Bulent Gultekin [presented by Günter Franke As part of the 37 th EFA Annual Meeting, the European Finance Association (EFA) and the European Institute for Advanced Studies in Management (EIASM) had again jointly organised a one-day Doctoral Tutorial for PhD students. Eight outstanding PhD students (including one from Estonia sponsored by NASDAQ as well as an auditor from the Czech Republic) were offered the opportunity to discuss their dissertation research with other doctoral students and leading academics in the broad field of finance. The Doctoral Tutorial was chaired by Loriana Pelizzon (University Ca Foscari of Venice), Bruno Gérard (Norwegian School of Management BI) and Frans de Roon (Tilburg University). President Miltersen thanked the participants and faculty for their hard work, and congratulated PhD student Tobias Berg (Munich University of Technology) for his paper entitled The Term Structure of Risk Premia during the Financial Crisis: Evidence from a New Calibration Approach Based on CDS Spreads for which he won the Best EFA / EIASM Doctoral Tutorial Paper Award co-sponsored by NASDAQ OMX and the Chicago Quantitative Alliance (CQA). Several other awards were presented to authors of outstanding papers at EFA 2010 in Frankfurt: EFA General Assembly Minutes Frankfurt, Germany 27 th August 2010 Page 4
EFA 2010 WINNERS GSI (Goldman Sachs International) Prize Best Conference Paper Credit Default Swaps and the Empty Creditor Problem by Martin Oehmke and Patrick Bolton (both at the Columbia Business School) EFA (European Finance Association) Prize Best Conference Paper by Doctoral Students Managerial Compensation in the Financial Industry by Felix Suntheim (Universita Bocconi) LECG (Law & Economics Consulting Group) Prize Best paper on Corporate Finance Labor and Capital: Is Debt a Bargaining Tool? by Eleni Simintzi, Vikrant Vig, Paolo Volpin (all at the London Business School) Commonfund Prize Best paper on Foundation and Endowment Asset Management Finding Bernie Madoff: Detecting Fraud by Investment Managers by Stephen G. Dimmock (Nanyang Technological University); William C. Gerken (Auburn University) Deutsche Bank Prize Best paper on Financial Economics published in the journal Review of Finance Corporate Governance Externalities by Viral Acharya and Paolo Volpin (both at Stern School of Business) The President thanked all of the sponsors of the Best Paper Awards for their support of EFA 2010. CLOSURE President Miltersen thanked the delegates for their attention and support, and wished them all a successful conference. On behalf of EFA, he thanked the Frankfurt team for having organized a wonderful event this year. Special thanks were extended to the programme committee, the project manager and the LOC, and the staff and volunteers who are all working hard to ensure the success of the event. Vice President Jan Krahnen reminded everyone that the Best Paper Awards as well as the honorary awards for Past EFA Presidents would soon be presented during the Gala Dinner. He hoped to see many delegates this evening (don t forget your tickets!) and at the remaining academic sessions on Saturday morning. Both the President and Vice President invited the delegates and their colleagues to attend EFA 2011 next year in Stockholm, Sweden. The meeting was adjourned at 6:15 p.m. ***** EFA General Assembly Minutes Frankfurt, Germany 27 th August 2010 Page 5