AQR Capital Management LLC established a $100,000 annual prize competition for academic papers in finance that “have the most significant practical implication for investors,” according to a statement by the investment management firm.
The competition for the prize, called the AQR Insight Award, “seeks unpublished papers that study investment in liquid assets for both tax-exempt institutional and taxable investor portfolios,” the statement said. “Areas of focus include asset allocation, security selection, portfolio implementation, and risk management.”
“Given the huge burden of future financial obligations, it's important to have leading thinkers in analytical finance and economics focus their intelligence on methods to enhance investment performance,” David G. Kabiller, AQR founding principal and head of client strategies, said in the statement. “The AQR Insight Award has been launched in recognition of the need to promote academic research that illuminates the drivers of successful investing and that can be applied to real-world portfolios.”
“AQR is eager to engage these researchers,” Mr. Kabiller continued. “Based on our experience in helping ideas germinate into actual strategies, we do expect the process to stimulate our own innovation — but our goal here is to recognize the acorns of good research.”
The finalists' papers will be available for the client-only section on AQR's website. Academics will not be precluded from making papers public on their own or having them published.
The panel the firm set up to award the prize, AQR Insight Award Committee, may divide the award among up to three competing entries depending on the quality of the submissions each year, the statement said.
Entries are due Jan. 15; entries may be submitted starting Oct. 17 through AQR's website. Inquires about the contest may be sent to [email protected]. The committee plans to award the prize sometime in May.
Up to five finalists will be invited to present their papers to the committee.
The committee includes Cliff Asness, founding and managing principal; John Liew, founding principals; and Mr. Kabiller .The others on the panel are Gregor Andrade, principal; Andrea Frazzini, senior researcher; Marco Hanig, president, AQR Funds, mutual funds managed by AQR Capital; Ronen Israel, principal; Michael Mendelson, principal; Mark Mitchell, founding principal of CNH Partners LLC, an AQR affiliate; Tobias Moskowitz, consultant to AQR and Fama Family Professor of Finance at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business; Lasse Pedersen, principal and John A. Paulson Professor of Finance and Alternative Investments at the New York University Stern School of Business; Todd Pulvino, CNH Partners founding principal; and Andrew Sterge, vice president.
