Forensic Analytical Research with Financial Focus including investigating potential Lending and other fraud

This project closes on December 31, 2024.

With downturns in markets, fraud is often revealed (think crypto recently). This is an excellent opportunity for those interested in uncovering fraud, data science, and learning about research. Opportunity for those intellectually curious students possibly interested in later pursuing a PHD. Current topics of fraud examination include: new frauds, PPP fraud, and crypto-currencies. Professor Griffin is Chaired McCombs professor and nationally recognized researcher. (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-12/this-texas-finance-p…) His research focuses on investigating and using big data, econometrics, statistics, machine learning, and other data tools to examine and often uncover questionable financial practices to shed light on the financial sector. 

Past Research assistants are a highly select group that have gone on to prestigious PHD programs and top finance jobs. Graduate Students can also apply for a higher level. Must be able to work at least 6-10 hours per week, can be much more in the summer. Please write a brief email to PHD candidate, Mr. Mahajan (prateek.mahajan@mccombs.utexas.edu) as to how you meet the requirements and what you hope to gain from the experience along with your resume. Also, cc Professor Griffin.

Qualifications

Looking for exceptional graduate and undergraduate students to assist in academic research mostly related to uncovering Financial Fraud. It is preferable to have at least some programming experience, especially experience with scraping and Natural Language Processing (NLP). For undergraduate students, we prefer Juniors (or Sophomores) that are honors students and with a high GPA.

Graduate Students can also apply for a higher level.

Must be extremely talented, self-motivated, diligent, and with a quantitative background. Open to various backgrounds and majors.

Project Timeline

Ongoing projects, possibly several semesters

Duties

-Data collection -Reading and editing research papers -Literature review and description -Data analysis -Text Analysis

Typical Time Commitment
5-10 hours but could be much more if available
Desired Length of Commitment
1 or more semesters

I'M INTERESTED IN THIS PROJECT. WHAT SHOULD I DO NEXT?

The Office of Undergraduate Research recommends that you attend an info session or advising before contacting faculty members or project contacts about research opportunities. We'll cover the steps to get involved, tips for contacting faculty, funding possibilities, and options for course credit. Once you have attended an Office of Undergraduate Research info session or spoken to an advisor, you can use the "Who to contact" details for this project to get in touch with the project leader and express your interest in getting involved.

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