The inaugural University of Maryland Center for Financial Policy (CFP), Singapore Management University's Sim Kee Boon Institute (SKBI), UBS Quant Investment Forum will be held in Singapore, bringing together leading academics and industry practitioners for a focused 1.5-day meeting on the transformative role of Artificial Intelligence and other new technologies in finance, with a focus on investment management and trading.
The forum is designed to be an intimate, high-quality venue for in-depth discussion and feedback. We seek pioneering papers that bridge rigorous academic research and practical application, with a special interest in investment-focused studies. The forum covers papers that:
- Apply novel AI methodologies to solve core problems in investments and financial markets.
- Utilize alternative data or foundational models to generate actionable insights for asset management, trading, or risk assessment.
- Offer relevant perspectives for Asian markets and the broader global investment community.
View the Call For Papers.
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Date: 15-16 June 2026
Venue: UBS University (9 Penang Road, 23845)
Note: Underlined names indicate the presenting co-author.
Day 1 (June 15, Monday)
9:00–9:15: Welcome Remarks — Paul-J Winter (UBS) & Russ Wermers (University of Maryland)
Session 1: AI as Researcher — Capabilities, Errors, and Disagreement (9:15–Noon)
Chaired by Bohui Zhang (CUHK Shenzhen)
9:15–10:00: Can AI Do Financial Research? LLM-Guided Hypothesis Discovery in Asset Pricing
Miao Liu (Boston College), Huan Liu (Google), and Danqing Mei (CKGSB) PAPER SLIDES
Discussant: Gang Li (CUHK)
10:00–10:45: AI “Errors”
Shihao Yu (SMU), Wenqian Huang (BIS), and Albert J. Menkveld (VU Amsterdam) PAPER SLIDES
Discussant: James O’Donovan (CityU HK) SLIDES
10:45–11:15: Coffee Break
11:15–12:00: When Machines Disagree: Evidence from Large Language Models
Si Cheng (Syracuse University), Lin Hu (ANU), and Kun Li (ANU) PAPER SLIDES
Discussant: Byoung-Hyoun Hwang (NTU) SLIDES
12:00–2:00: Lunch
Lunch Talk (12:45–1:45)
Generative AI and Knowledge-Informed Deep Learning for Asset Pricing and Investment Management, Lin William Cong (NTU) SLIDES
Click on the links below to view relevant papers:
AlphaPortfolio | Panel Tree | Uncommon Factors | Mosaics of Predictability | SKINNS
Session 2: Machine Learning in Investments (2:00–5:15)
Chaired by Melvyn Teo (SMU)
2:00–2:45: Distant Investments: Decoding Mutual Fund Skill through Fund-Firm Semantic Alignment
Xiyuan Ma (SMU), Matthew Spiegel (Yale), Hong Zhang (SMU), and Yijun Zhou (FSU) PAPER SLIDES
Discussant: Hongye Guo (HKU) SLIDES
2:45–3:15: Coffee Break
3:15–4:00: Active Machine-Learning-Based Trading and Mutual Fund Performance
Xiaowen Hu (Southern Methodist), Maximilian Rohrer (NHH), and Hanjiang Zhang (WSU) PAPER SLIDES
Discussant: Qifei Zhu (NUS) SLIDES
4:00–4:45: Conditional Asset Pricing with Text-Managed Portfolios
Jian Feng (PKU), Jiantao Huang (HKU), Shiyang Huang (HKU), and Ran Shi (U Colorado) PAPER SLIDES
Discussant: Frank Weikai Li (CityU HK) SLIDES
4:45–5:15: Networking and Discussion Break
Day 2 (June 16, Tuesday)
Session 3: Informational Networks and Market Frictions (9:00–Noon)
Chaired by Wenlan Qian (NUS)
9:00–9:45: When LLMs Go Abroad: Foreign Bias in AI Financial Predictions
Xiang Yi (HK PolyU), Sean Cao (U Maryland), and Charles C.Y. Wang (Harvard)
Discussant: Bohui Zhang (CUHK Shenzhen) SLIDES
9:45–10:30: The Network Foundations of Credit Counterparty Risk: Theory and Evidence
Belinda Chen (SAIF/SJTU), and Jonathan Brogaard (U Utah) PAPER SLIDES
Discussant: Zhuo Chen (PBCSF, Tsinghua) SLIDES
10:30–11:00: Coffee Break
11:00–11:45: Informed Trading under the Microscope: Evidence from 30 Years of Daily Hedge Fund Trades PAPER SLIDES
Jianfeng Hu (SMU), JinGi Ha (Soongsil University), and Yuehua Tang (U Florida)
Discussant: Chengcheng Qu (APU Japan) SLIDES
11:45–12:00: Concluding Remarks — Paul-J Winter (UBS) & Russ Wermers (University of Maryland)
12:00–1:00: Lunch
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