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CORPORATE FINANCE FIN3016
RESEARCH PAPER GUIDELINES 2022/23
PURPOSE
The purpose of the research paper is to provide students with the opportunity to undertake a
piece of original, independent financial research. This project will be something tangible which
you can show potential employers. The end-product will be similar to a mini-dissertation or
research paper. The research paper is an individual piece of work.
MARKING SCHEME
The project accounts for 75% of your overall module mark. The breakdown of marks for the
project is as follows:
Please refer to Appendix 1 which provides an outline of the feedback sheet you will receive
and the marking criteria. The suggested page lengths for each section below will give you an
indication of how the marks for each section are weighted.
REQUIREMENTS FOR THE RESEARCH PAPER
The research paper is to be no more than 15 pages long including title page, tables, figures,
and appendices. References are excluded from the 15-page limit. Your text (apart from tables
and footnotes) should be double-spaced using size 12 Times New Roman font. Standard
margins should be used. Research papers which don’t meet these requirements will not be
accepted.
Each research paper should have the following:
1. Your title, name and student number on the first page.
2. An abstract of less than 100 words. This should summarise your paper, and be on the
first page.
3. An introduction (1-2 pages) which details what the research paper is about is about
(your research questions), why it is important, your main findings, and a short (one
paragraph) overview of what you do in each section.
4. A literature review and theoretical section. (approx. 3 pages). This should be critical
of the literature. It should also tie in with what you are doing in your empirical work.
2
It shouldn’t be a comprehensive literature review of all the major papers!! It should
contain your main hypotheses.
5. Data and Methodology section (approx. 2 pages) – How are you going to test your
hypotheses? Where is your data from? What is your methodology? Any data
problems?
6. Results and Analysis section (approx. 6 pages) - Tables and figures of results. State
your findings. Explain your findings. How do your results fit in with the literature?
7. Conclusion (approx. 1-2 pages) - summary of findings, weaknesses of your paper,
possible future research.
8. References – please note that all and only cited papers should be in your references.
Please follow the Harvard style of referencing.
Failure to reference properly will result in marks being deducted.
9. You should follow the formatting style of the Journal of Finance or Journal of Financial
Economics. Make sure your tables and figures follow this style, particularly when
presenting econometric results.
Please refer to Appendix 2 for further information on the layout and content of your
project
DATA FOR THE PROJECTS
You will need to collect your own data for the project. All the guides to the main financial
databases are available on Canvas. I have also put up some datasets. You may wish to look at
other sources, please ensure they are credible and you can verify the integrity of your data.
POSSIBLE TOPICS