Onassis Prizes honour world leading academics

Nobel Laureates help select winners of $600,000 prize fund for shipping, trade and finance

The winners of the 2015 Onassis Prizes, awarded to the world’s foremost academics in the fields of finance, international trade and shipping, will be announced by the Lord Mayor of London, Alderman Alan Yarrow at Mansion House in London on Friday 20th March.

The prestigious prizes, each worth $200,000, are sponsored by the Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation and awarded every three years by Cass Business School, part of City University London, jointly with the Onassis Foundation.

Judged by a panel of distinguished academics, including two Nobel Laureates, the prizes recognise the contribution of world leading academics to the fields of finance, international trade and shipping.

The awards are intended to honour academic achievements that have not previously had a platform for global recognition and it is hoped they will in time receive the same prestige as the Nobel Prize for .

Onassis Prize for Finance

Two academics - Professor Stewart Myers and Professor Richard Roll – share the 2015 Onassis Prize for Finance.

Professor Stewart Myers, the Robert C. Merton (1970) Professor of from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is best known for his influential research on capital structure and capital budgeting valuation. Throughout his distinguished career he has had a significant influence on the theory of banking and corporate finance and is notable for coining the term “real option”.

Professor Richard Roll, Distinguished Professor of Finance holds the Joel Fried Chair in Applied Finance at the UCLA Anderson School of Management. Professor Roll is widely acclaimed for his work on portfolio theory and asset pricing. While at the Boeing Company he worked on the 727 and the operating manual for the first stage booster of the Saturn moon rocket. His PhD thesis The Behavior of Interest Rates: An Application of the Efficient Market Model to U.S. Treasury Bills won the Prize in 1968.

This year’s winners have made foundational contributions to finance since the beginning of its transformation to a rigorous science-based discipline, nearly a half century ago: Stewart Myers in corporate finance and Richard Roll in capital markets.

Onassis Prize for International Trade Professor Gene Grossman of has received the 2015 Onassis Prize for International Trade. Professor Grossman is widely acclaimed for his research on international competitiveness in research-intensive industries and has won numerous professional awards including the Bernard-Harms Prize from the Kiel Institute for the World Economy. He is best known for his work on the Environmental Kuznets Curve and for his book, written in collaboration with , entitled Innovation and Growth in the Global Economy.

Professor Grossman has received the Onassis Prize for International Trade in recognition of his outstanding contributions to strategic trade policy, environmental economics and the economics of offshoring.

Onassis Prize for Shipping

Two academics – Emeritus Professor Trevor Heaver and Dr Martin Stopford – share the 2015 Onassis Prize for Shipping.

Professor Trevor Heaver spent many years as the Director of the Centre for Transportation Studies at the Sauder School of Business, University of British Columbia and is best known for his work on transport economics particularly international shipping and logistics. Professor Heaver was also a founding member and Past-President of the World Conference on Transport Research.

Dr Martin Stopford, Non-Executive President of Clarksons Research Services Limited is a widely acclaimed British economist. His seminal text on shipping economics and finance entitled Maritime Economics was awarded the Chojeong Book Prize in 2005 in recognition of the significant contribution it has made to the shipping industry. Dr Stopford received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Lloyd’s List Global Shipping Awards in 2010.

Dr Anthony Papadimitriou, President of the Onassis Public Benefit Foundation and Chairman of the panel of prize judges, said:

“Onassis became famous in his lifetime, and after, for his mastery of the science and art of Shipping, Trade and Finance. The Onassis Foundation is proud to associate once more the name of its Founder with the Corporation of the City of London and the Costas Grammenos Center for Shipping Trade and Finance (City University London) which respectively are world centers of the practice and academic study of these three entrepreneurship areas. This third edition of the Prizes is on an unparalleled level”.

Commenting on the winners, Professor Costas Grammenos, who is the founder of Cass Business School’s International Centre for Shipping, Trade and Finance and was instrumental in launching the prizes, said:

“The Onassis Prizes recognise the lifetime contribution of some of the world’s most highly respected academics in finance, international trade and shipping. I warmly congratulate the winners whose distinguished achievements have profoundly influenced their disciplines and continue to have an impact on academic thinking and business conduct worldwide.”

The prizes will be announced by the Lord Mayor of the City of London, Alderman Alan Yarrow, at a ceremony in Mansion House. The Onassis Prizes panel of judges consists of: Mr. Anthony S. Papadimitriou, President, Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation; Professor George Constantinides, Leo Melamed Professor of Finance, ; Professor Charles Goodhart, Professor Emeritus, London School of Economics; Professor Costas Th. Grammenos, Head of the International Centre for Shipping, Trade and Finance, Cass Business School, London; Professor Robert Merton (Nobel Laureate) School of Management Distinguished Professor of Finance, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; and Professor (Nobel Laureate) Frank E. Buck Professor of Finance, Emeritus, Stanford Graduate School of Business.

The Onassis Public Benefit Foundation is named in honour of Alexander Onassis, son of the Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis, who died in 1975.

ENDS/

Media enquiries: Sophie Cubbin, PR and Communications Manager, Cass Business School Tel: +44 (0)20 7040 8734 or 07817 037 919 Email: [email protected]

Notes to Editors:

The Onassis Foundation was established in December 1975 in accordance with Aristotle Onassis' last wish to honour the memory of his son, Alexander. Culture, education, the environment, health, and social solidarity come first on the agenda of the Foundation while all of its projects relate to Greece or Greek culture and civilisation. In the sector of social solidarity the Foundation promotes significant public benefit projects, while according to both the Foundation's regulations and the wishes of Aristotle Onassis, individual charity is not allowed.

All activities of the Onassis Foundation are funded exclusively by the profits of an autonomous and institutionally independent Business Foundation named Alexander S. Onassis Foundation, which engages mainly in shipping, real estate and financial products investments. For further information visit: www.onassis.gr

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