Louvain Finance
Louvain Finance (LFIN) is a research center of the Université catholique de Louvain located in Belgium. It has been founded in 2016 and it now houses about 11 professors and 15 researchers. LFIN promotes and contributes to academic research in Finance via its research projects and the organization of top-level PhD courses, conferences and other public research activities. The Center’s main area of expertise are related to most of the areas of finance, including Asset Pricing, International Finance, Asset and Risk Management, Mathematical Finance, Macro-Finance, Market Microstructure, Corporate Finance and Behavioral Finance.
LFIN is leading several innovative projects, such as the first Bloomberg learning center in Belgium and it is supported in its activities by leading private institutions such as TreeTop Asset Management, Candriam, and ING.
Location
The position is based on the Mons campus of UCLouvain (campus FUCaM).
Job description
The position involves research activities within the context of an ARC (Actions de Recherche Concertées, internal funding at UCLouvain) project entitled “Negative and ultra-low interest rates: behavioral and quantitative modelling”. In particular, the candidate will collaborate on the behavioral axis of this project. The candidate will undertake a doctoral research and register for our PhD programme in Economics and Management sciences (with orientation finance).
The candidate will also take part in the LFIN activities:
- contribute to the development of the Financial data center of Louvain Finance, in particular by being a point of contact for datasets such as Bloomberg;
- contribute to the development of the Louvain Finance team, by for example managing the organization of important events or seminars;
- actively participate to the research events organized by Louvain Finance.
Some teaching activities on the Mons campus might be required but are limited to 30 hours a year.
Requirements
- Having a Master degree (min 90 ECTS) in finance, management, economics or any related fields by July 2018 - for outstanding profiles, this deadline could be extended to September 2018;
- Excellent results (average grades of 80% or more);
- Excellent knowledge of English (knowledge of French is not required);
- Strong empirical and/or quantitative skills;
- Strong motivation for research;
- Good knowledge or willingness to manage financial datasets such as Bloomberg, Bureau van Dijk, etc.
Contract
The appointment should start in September or October 2018 for a period of three (or four) years.
We offer:
- competitive salary, among the highest at European level for such a position;
- outstanding, dynamic, international, and multidisciplinary research environment, at the highest level according to European standards;
- possibility to collaborate with outstanding international scholars;
- opportunity to have scientific stay(s) abroad (in agreement with the Ph.D. supervisor).
Recently graduated Ph.D. students from Louvain Finance are now working at National Banks (National Bank of Belgium and National Bank of Luxembourg), private institutions (such as KPMG) and universities (Rotterdam School of Management or IESEG business school).
Information and application
Applications must have to be sent to Prof. Catherine D’Hondt before June 30, 2018, with curriculum vitae, letter of motivation, degree, transcript of grades, and possibly one or two letters of recommendation.
Further information can be obtained from Prof. Catherine D’Hondt or Prof. Rudy De Winne, Chaussée de Binche, 151 - 7000 Mons (Belgium). All practical information needed by foreign candidates are available on the website of the European researchers’ mobility portal.