Martin C. Schmalz

Martin C. Schmalz
Born1984 or 1985 (age 40–41)[1]
NationalityGerman
OccupationEconomist
AwardsArtur Fischer Preis
Academic background
EducationUniversity of Stuttgart and Princeton University
Academic work
DisciplineFinance, Accounting, Management, and Economics
InstitutionsUniversity of Oxford's Saïd Business School

Martin Schmalz is a German financial economist. He is a professor of Finance, Economics, and Real Estate at the University of Oxford's Saïd Business School.[2]

Education

Schmalz graduated with a Diplom-Ingenieur in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Stuttgart[3] as the valedictorian, winning the Artur Fischer Preis. He received a scholarship from the Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes, Germany’s most prestigious scholarship foundation. He obtained his PhD in economics from Bendheim Center for Finance[4] of Princeton University,[5] and was granted a Fellowship of Woodrow Wilson Scholars while pursuing it.[6]

Career

Schmalz served as assistant professor of finance at the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business from 2012 to 2018.[7][8] He then joined Oxford's Saïd Business School as associate professor of finance (with tenure) in 2019. He was elected Head of the Finance, Accounting, Management, and Economics Area in 2022.[9]

In 2023, Schmalz was also named the Chief Economist and Director of the Office of Economic and Risk Analysis (OERA) of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB).[10] He succeeded Luigi Zingales in this role, who was the founding director of PCAOB's Center for Economic Analysis since 2013.[11] He served there until May of 2025. [12]

Additionally, since 2023 he serves as a Director of Global Corporate Governance Colloquia (GCGC).[13]

Teaching

Schmalz is the Academic Director of Oxford's Blockchain Strategy Programme[14] and co-director of the AI in Fintech and Open Banking Programme. He co-authored the book The Business of Big Data: How to Create Lasting Value in the Age of AI.[15] Poets and Quants named him one of the "40 under 40" best business school professors in the world in 2018.[16]

Research

Schmalz is most well known for his research at the intersection of corporate governance,[17] industrial organization, and antitrust economics.[18][19][20]

He has been called to testify to The White House Council of Economic Advisers, FTC Hearings on Common Ownership and Competition,[21] The U.S. Department of Justice, European Parliament, Australian Parliament, various central banks, and competition authorities worldwide.[9]

His research covers law, finance, and economics, and focuses on the intersection of asset management, asset pricing, industrial organization, and corporate governance. He co-authored the paper "Anticompetitive Effects of Common Ownership",[22] which launched a literature on "common ownership" of competitors and, as of 2023, was one of the most cited articles published in the Journal of Finance in the past five years,[23] and has been called an "economic blockbuster" by Harvard Law School Professor Einer Elhauge.[24][25]

He also co-authored the Journal of Political Economy article "Common Ownership, Competition, and Top Management Incentives" which proves that benign neglect by shareholders is a sufficient mechanism to explain the results in the empirical literature on "common ownership".[26]

The 2017 paper "Housing Collateral and Entrepreneurship", written together with David Sraer and David Thesmar, received the Brattle Group Distinguished Paper Prize.[27]

Arte's documentary on BlackRock also covers the research on antitrust.[18]

As of May 2025, Martin Schmalz is cited over 4600 times according to his Google Scholar page.[28]

Fellowships and grants

In 2024, Martin Schmalz was awarded with a €1.7 million HORIZON-ERC research grant by European Research Council. [29] [30]

In 2021, Schmalz received a $45 000 grant from the Washington Center for Equitable Growth for his project “Welfare Effects of Common Ownership.”[31]

In 2020, Schmalz received a three-year research grant from the Norwegian Finance Initiative at Norges Bank Investment Management to analyse how changes in ownership, compensation structures, and communication from owners affect management behaviour.[32]

In 2019, Martin Schmalz was awarded a £40 000 Pemberton grant to support his research on the European private debt market.[33] The same year, he received two awards from the Oxford Saïd Business School Faculty Research Fund: for his study “Horizon dependent risk aversion, preference reversals and demand for commitment,” and for his research on “Disagreement in Optimal Security Design.”[34] [35]

In 2016, Schmalz was appointed to the NBD Bancorp Assistant Professorship in Business Administration at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business.[36] From 2014 to 2015, he was awarded the NTT Research Fellowship.[37]

Academic visits

Schmalz was a visiting scholar at the Center for Economic Studies (CES) at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich in 2016, during which time he was affiliated with the University of Michigan.[38]

Other activities

In addition to his academic career, Martin Schmalz is also a licensed commercial pilot certified by the U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). He holds a license to fly commercial planes and private helicopters,[39] demonstrating proficiency in aviation operations and safety regulations.

In February of 2020, Martin Schmalz was a guest on Chris Williamson's podcast Modern Wisdom[40]

References

  1. ^ "2018 Best 40 Under 40 Professors: Martin Schmalz, Ross School of Business". Poets and Quants. April 23, 2018.
  2. ^ "Martin Schmalz - Saïd Business School".
  3. ^ "New hires at Saïd Business School" (PDF). Saïd Business School.
  4. ^ "Annual Report 2012" (PDF). BCF, Princeton University. p. 7.
  5. ^ "Martin Schmalz". Princeton University.
  6. ^ "Martin Schmalz's personal website". Google sites.
  7. ^ "Martin Schmalz, Ph.D." University of Michigan.
  8. ^ Carter, Andrea (24 April 2018). "2018 Best 40 Under 40 Professors: Martin Schmalz, Ross School of Business". Poets&Quants.
  9. ^ a b "Martin Schmalz". Saïd Business School. 22 June 2023.
  10. ^ Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (August 28, 2023). "Martin C. Schmalz Named PCAOB Chief Economist and Director of Its Office of Economic and Risk Analysis". pcaobus.org. Retrieved August 29, 2023.
  11. ^ Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (November 6, 2013). "PCAOB Announces Center for Economic Analysis". pcaobus.org. Retrieved August 30, 2023.
  12. ^ Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (May 8, 2025). "Dr. Joshua T. White Named PCAOB's Acting Chief Economist and OERA Director; Dr. Martin C. Schmalz Returns to University of Oxford". pcaobus.org. Retrieved May 14, 2025.
  13. ^ "Global corporate governance colloquia forges ahead into its second phase". ecgi.global. June 17, 2023. Retrieved August 29, 2023.
  14. ^ "Oxford Blockchain Strategy Programme". Saïd Business School.
  15. ^ "Henry Thornton Lecture with Professor Martin Schmalz". City, University of London. 31 March 2023.
  16. ^ Carter, Andrea (24 April 2018). "2018 Best 40 Under 40 Professors: Martin Schmalz, Ross School of Business". Poets&Quants.
  17. ^ "Are ETFs Killing Future Stock Market Returns?". Bloomberg.com. 2 February 2023.
  18. ^ a b "Martin Schmalz: Asset managers will not solve the world's problems". Handelsblatt.
  19. ^ "Research from Martin Schmalz referenced by the White House". Saïd Business School. 7 June 2022.
  20. ^ "Why Larry Fink May Be the Trustbusters' Next Target". TheStreet. 30 September 2016.
  21. ^ "Martin Schmalz' Presentation on Common Ownership". Federal Trade Commission. 16 June 2023.
  22. ^ "Anticompetitive Effects of Common Ownership: Anticompetitive Effects of Common Ownership". The Journal of Finance. 73 (4): 1513–1565. August 2018. doi:10.1111/jofi.12698.
  23. ^ "Top 25 Cited Recent Articles". The American Finance Association.
  24. ^ Elhauge, Einer (10 March 2016). "Horizontal Shareholding". Harvard Law Review.
  25. ^ "The Case for Doing Nothing About Common Ownership of Competing Firms | CLS Blue Sky Blog". Columbia Law School. 20 June 2018.
  26. ^ "Common Ownership, Competition, and Top Management Incentives". Yale Department of Economics.
  27. ^ "The Brattle Group Prizes for best papers in Corporate Finance for 2017". 15 February 2018.
  28. ^ "Martin C Schmalz".
  29. ^ ERC Consolidator Grants 2024 – List of Principal Investigators (All Domains) (PDF) (Report). European Research Council. 3 December 2024. p. 22. Retrieved 14 May 2025.
  30. ^ "Professor Martin Schmalz wins major European grant for key investment research". Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. 19 December 2024. Retrieved 14 May 2025.
  31. ^ "Welfare Effects of Common Ownership". Washington Center for Equitable Growth. Retrieved 14 May 2025.
  32. ^ "Funding three research projects to study effects of corporate governance". Norges Bank Investment Management. 17 November 2020. Retrieved 15 May 2025.
  33. ^ "Private debt funds and direct lending grew significantly in the last decade". ABF Journal. Retrieved 14 May 2025.
  34. ^ "Research Community Newsletter MT19" (PDF). Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Retrieved 14 May 2025.
  35. ^ "Research Community Newsletter Trinity 2019" (PDF). Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Retrieved 14 May 2025.
  36. ^ "Michigan Ross and University Regents Recognize Outstanding Faculty". Positive Orgs, University of Michigan. Retrieved 15 May 2025.
  37. ^ "Conference Proceedings: Financing Payouts (NTT Research Fellowship)" (PDF). University of International Business and Economics. Retrieved 15 May 2025.
  38. ^ "Former Visiting Scholars - Center for Economic Studies (CES) - LMU Munich". Center for Economic Studies, LMU Munich. Retrieved 2024-12-04.
  39. ^ "FAA Registry Search". FAA Registry. Federal Aviation Administration. Retrieved March 7, 2024. Information obtained from the FAA Registry search using the person's name
  40. ^ "Modern Wisdom #144 - Martin Schmalz - Artificial Intelligence, Big Data & China". Apple Podcasts. Retrieved May 1, 2025.