International College of Economics and Finance

ICEF MSc Students Passed Thesis Defense

ICEF MSc Students Passed Thesis Defense

Of the 18 students who presented their thesis studies, 3 received the maximum score (10) and 7 excellent scores (8 and 9). This year’s class’s theses deal with topics as diverse as cryptocurrency markets, pension schemes, gender impact on financial transactions, and even climate trade and carbon futures pricing.

The authors of the top-scoring master’s theses are as follows:

  • Kamilla Bakhtieva

Thesis title: The Financial Factors of the Timing of Retirement Before and After the COVID-19

Supervisor: Prof. Elena Kotyrlo, HSE Faculty of Economic Sciences.

  • Alexey Kipriyanov

Thesis title: Regulator's Dilemma: Short Selling Ban vs Capital Requirements under Basel III

Supervisor: Sofya Budanova, Associate Professor, HSE ICEF.

  • Grigory Kuzmin

Thesis title: Various Measures of Informed Trading. Application to the Cryptocurrency Markets

Supervisor: Professor Alexey Boulatov, HSE ICEF.

Other topics that have been covered brilliantly in the master’s theses include:

  • Distribution of Income and Physical Shape within Russian Family Couples;
  • The Determinants of Carbon Emissions Futures Prices;
  • The Impact of Board Gender Diversity on the Long-Term M&A Performance. Analysis of US Market;
  • The Effect of Imposed Sanctions in 2014 on Capital Structure of Russian Firms.

Alexey Kipriyanov

Alexey Kipriyanov

My master’s thesis is entitled Regulator’s Dilemma: Short Selling Ban vs Capital Requirements under Basel III and it follows up on the research work that I started in the first year of my master’s study. I think there were two reasons why I chose this topic, the first being the opportunity to gain a deeper insight into the phenomena I had been studying earlier, and the second reason being that my topic has been covered in scientific literature only poorly. This latter point added novelty and complexity. The level of scientific novelty displayed in my study wasn’t the last thing that earned me the top score.

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Kamilla Bakhtieva

Kamilla Bakhtieva

Like many of my classmates, I chose the topic for my thesis from the list proposed by our research supervisors. It seemed logical to pick the one I already had the experience with and liked most, so finally I chose to do a microeconomic study, which involved the empirical data from RLMS (The Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey, a series of nationally representative surveys). I am familiar with it from the first year of my master’s study. 

One thing that helped me write a winning thesis was the research seminars conducted by my supervisor, where we regularly looked at the structural composition of course papers and theses, as well as the empirical methods they involved. I did a lot of reading on my chosen topic and have benefitted greatly from my previous experience of writing studies over the course of six years as an HSE student.

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Grigory Kuzmin

Grigory Kuzmin

I have been studying the market microstructure for about four years now and wrote my first study in my third year. My thesis is, in fact, the result of the many-year research on my chosen topic, which explains why it scored the highest. It explores the informed trading models and uses cryptocurrencies as an example of a relatively new financial asset to apply the mathematical models to. My focus is more on modeling methodologies. I propose some novel measures and approaches to interpreting the long established concepts. While many academics seem to be quite skeptical about cryptocurrency as topic for the graduation theses, I wouldn’t callit a “trend” or “hype”. I see cryptocurrencies as another newly emerged financial instrument and a medium to test the known financial models on, just the way they are applied to trading strategies and market regulation.

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