Benchmark 2023

March 24, 2023

Round One Results

Following abstracts have been shortlisted for the second round and are invited to submit full papers by 15th May 2023.

Young Scholars Track

Team ID Team Name Team ID Team Name
U8O1QR48 Tuvoi UEG73N53 The Game Changers
U759QAH5 WitnessingWorld U1X459HM The Wall Street Dalaals
UW10E92A Bongo U5S337DJ GRIFINDO
U655K5IL It makes sense UPK287S2 Pokemons
U3F73A7U Acex UX2Q7W16 Consistent Compounders
U642BO7N Saloni Singhal U7Z4A61S WARRIORS
UW21P9A9 EnRoaders UVY5374M Rebooters
UP14XY69 Scam 2023 UWS4551T Vandana Vuppuluri
US535Q1U Business Geeks U0D86B0E Rishu Raj
U0AT26W1 580854-U0AT26W1 UA8H3K79 580854-UA8H3K79

Doctoral Track

Team ID Team Name Team ID Team Name
UFY6V542 582347-UFY6V542 UNR553E6 Navendu Prakash
UK2332HN MANISHA YADAV UO2M9B53 582347-UO2M9B53
U99PH0E2 ATUL PARAD U344BS3I 582347-U344BS3I
UH6I334T Elaine IE UK4I95P6 Lagan Jindal
U4JD4S43 Karan Sonal U6121QUR 582347-U6121QUR
U78E78FC 582347-U78E78FC UFH6R835 582347-UFH6R835
USBL6972 Tushar Bhuwad UZE9984X Aashvi
UO8EP848 582347-UO8EP848 UPZ9D546 CHARU VADHAVA
UDJ857W8 Mayank Gupta USX056Y1 582347-USX056Y1
U2D6I20E Chak de fatte U4J8V5E6 582347-U4J8V5E6
U27K88ZB Ravindra Patil

About CFI

SPJIMR’s Centre for Financial Innovation (CFI) contributes perspectives and policy advice to the financial services industry in the areas of Financial Innovation and Markets & Risk. CFI focuses on research & consulting, education and finTech accelerator; to enhance thought leadership in Financial Innovation and Markets & Risk.

 

Benchmark 2023

About the Contest

Yes Securities Benchmark 2023 is a one of its kind practitioner-oriented research contest conducted by CFS. It calls for original research papers with a practitioner focus on finance, focusing on research questions based on any one of the themes outlined below. This contest gives participants an opportunity to showcase their research skills, espouse high-quality practitioner engagement and gain recognition for the same.

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To learn more watch SPJIMR faculty share their perspectives about Benchmark 2023

Prof. Arunima Haldar
Prof. Shalini Talwar

Participants Profile

The contest is open to participants from India or abroad. Applications will be accepted from participants applying, as individual participants or in a team of two.

The contest has two tracks:

Young Scholars Track

This track is open to the following category of participants:

  • Pursuing a postgraduate management degree from a Business School or
  • In the 3rd year or final year of engineering or
  • In the final year of a 3-year bachelor’s program in commerce, computer science, accountancy, management or
  • Recent graduates in any of the above streams with not more than 2 years of experience

Doctoral Track

This track is open to the following category of participants:

  • Part of a Ph.D. programme at any of the leading institutes
  • Have successfully completed Ph.D. programme and working as a faculty or researcher with academia or corporate

Structure of the Contest

The contest will have three rounds as follows:

First Round

The participants are required to submit an abstract of 500 words.

Second Round

This track is open to the following category of participants:

  • The selection committee will shortlist select abstracts from the First Round.
  • The teams qualifying for Second Round will have to submit a full research paper with a word count of 2500-4000 words (excluding tables, figures and references).

Final Round

This track is open to the following category of participants:

  • The selection committee will shortlist the top 5 papers each under Young Scholars & Doctoral tracks; a total of 10 papers across both these tracks.
  • The top 10 teams will be invited for a Paper Presentation at SPJIMR campus in Andheri, Mumbai.
  • Out of these 10 teams, the top 3 teams, each under Young Scholars & Doctoral track, will be recognised and awarded cash prizes by an esteemed Jury Panel.

Themes of the Contest

The topics for the research papers need to be based on any topic pertaining to the following broad themes:

  • Financial Innovation which includes FinTech, ESG, innovative ideas or practices in Finance
  • Markets & Risks, which includes all areas of Financial Markets and Risk Management

The participants are free to choose a research question of their choice pertaining to any area in the above-mentioned topics or they may choose to research in one of the four specific sub-themes given below.

Sub Themes

  1. Payment Gateways, including virtual cards, voice payments and blockchain technology
  2. Artificial intelligence predictions, big data growth and smart algorithms
  3. Eco-system enablers required for the participation of Indian Banks for financing M&A transactions in the country*
  4. Proactive role to be played by players in the Financial sector in the country for effective adoption of ESG framework*

* The best research papers in the sub-themes numbered 3 and 4 above will receive an honorarium of Rs. 10,000/- each from SBI Caps and under each of the tracks – Young Scholars & Doctoral tracks. This honorarium is over and above the cash prize that will be awarded to winning teams.

Evaluation

Benchmark 2023 aims to enhance industry – academia engagement. So, the focus is to enhance thought leadership that maximises practitioner benefits. Hence the research papers submitted should necessarily have the following 4 aspects.

  1. Define the problem statement from a practitioner’s perspective.
  2. Theoretical foundations / expositions / academic literature referred to build the solutions for the problem statement.
  3. Practical examples from industry that illustrate the relevance of the problem statement and the solutions.
  4. Solutions and recommendations that may be based on industry feedback (surveys, interviews, etc.), similar cases, quantitative or qualitative analysis or a unique idea. The Paper should illustrate validation of the idea / solutions / recommendations and the results achieved or may be achieved from a practitioner’s perspective.

Participants are allowed to use their research published in the last 2 years to build a practitioner focused version of the published research paper. However, submission of an existing published paper with minimal incremental work would not be favourably considered.

Jury will focus on practitioner relevance and accordingly would give higher weightage to aspects 3 and 4 listed above and ideally at least 50% of the paper should focus on these two aspects.

Participants must properly give references to the publications they have referred to for their submission.

Awards

The top 3 papers from each of the tracks will be awarded cash prizes along with certificates as given below

awards

*Doctoral Track

In addition to cash prizes, the participants ranking first and second under the Doctoral Track would be eligible to apply for Faculty positions at SPJIMR and would be invited for Faculty Research Seminars.

Submission Guidelines

Structure of the Research Paper

  • Each paper should begin with the Title, followed by names of the authors and their affiliations.
  • Figures: All charts should be numbered and inscribed at the locations corresponding to their references within the article.
  • Plagiarism: Please note that plagiarized articles will be rejected.
  • Strictly adhere to the given word limit mentioned here for the extended abstract and the final research paper.

Format

  • The font should be Times New Roman, 12 font size, single line spacing and 1-inch margin. The style of referencing should be APA referencing. The file should be sent in PDF format.
  • For Young Scholars track: The file name should be as: YS_ First Name of the author. In the case of group entries, the file name should be as: YS_Team name.
  • For Doctoral track: The file name should be as: DT_ First Name of the author. In the case of group entries, the file name should be as: DT_Team name.

Submission Process

Participants must register and submit their abstract as well as the final paper through

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Timelines

Activity Deadline
Registrations for the Young Scholars Track have closed 31st January 23
Registrations for the Doctoral Track have closed 6th Feb 23
Abstract submission for the Young Scholars Track 28th Feb 23
Abstract submission for the Doctoral Track 7th March 23
Results announcement Round 1 24th March 23
Submission of full papers 15th May 23
Results announcement Round 2 15th June 23
Final presentations at SPJIMR Campus 15th July 23

Registration Link

Register Now

In case of any queries or clarifications please email to cfs@spjimr.org

Coordinators

Name Phone No Email
Manali Phatak 022-6145-4512 cfs@spjimr.org
Mrunmai Brid 022-6145-4265 cfs@spjimr.org

Other aspects to note

  • The decision of Selection Committee & Jury would be final.
  • CFS reserves its right for making amendments to any aspects of the contest.
  • The following would be provided for teams shortlisted for final presentation at SPJIMR campus in Mumbai. This would be provided only for outstation teams.
    • Food & Accommodation (for one night)
    • Travel Reimbursement of up to Rs.12,000/- per team. Travel reimbursement will be restricted to the cost incurred by the teams on their own personal account and would be against actual receipts i.e., Original Ticket / E-Ticket, Boarding Pass, Proof of Payment.
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