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Winner of the Liechtenstein Banking Award 2014

On 27 November 2014 the prizegiving ceremony for the Liechtenstein Banking Award took place at the University of Liechtenstein. The Liechtenstein Banking Association (LBV) and the University of Liechtenstein awarded prizes to two graduates from the Faculty of Banking and Finance for the outstanding academic achievement and practical relevance of their thesis projects.


On 27 November 2014 the prizegiving ceremony for the Liechtenstein Banking Award took place at the University of Liechtenstein. The occasion also serves as a platform for networking among representatives of the industry. The Liechtenstein Banking Association (LBV) and the University of Liechtenstein awarded prizes to two graduates from the Faculty of Banking and Finance for the outstanding academic achievement and practical relevance of their thesis projects.


All the thesis projects submitted at a glance
Further photos in the Facebook album


 


Fourteen theses from the Banking and Financial Management MA course and the BA course in ‘Theory of Business Administration, with a special focus on International Financial Services’ were submitted for consideration by a jury of six professional experts. This year’s prizewinners are Radovan Studník from Brno and Michael J. Weiser from Vienna. For their thesis projects developed as part of the BA / MA course they have just completed, each of the two graduates received a prize cheque to the value of CHF 2,500 from Simon Tribelhorn, Managing Director of the Liechtenstein Banking Association, and Professor Marco J. Menichetti of the Faculty of Business Administration, Banking and Financial Management of the University of Liechtenstein. In conclusion they gave a presentation of their award-winning thesis projects to the assembled audience of professionals. 



The two prizewinners of the Liechtenstein Banking Award 2014: Radovan Studník, MSc (left) and Michael J. Weiser, BSc (right)


A jury of academic experts and practical players

The six-man jury of specialists consisted this year of two professors from the University of Liechtenstein, Michael Hanke and Marco Menichetti, together with Dipl. Ing. ETH Adolf E. Real, MBA, President of the Liechtenstein Banking Association, Lic.iur. Elisabeth Zwicky-Mosimann, LL.M., former Head of Legal & Tax at LGT Financial Services, Professor Heinz Knecht, Head of the Retail & Corporate Banking Division and a member of the Management Board and Group Executive Board of the National Bank of Liechtenstein (LLB) and the external expert Professor Alex Weissensteiner of the Technical University of Denmark. 


Relevance to Liechtenstein as a financial centre

Michael J. Weiser was awarded the prize for his concluding thesis on the BA course in ‘Business Administration with a special focus on International Financial Services’. He had been selected for the University of Liechtenstein’s High Potential Programme, and since completing his studies has been working as a trustee and business economist for Lopag Trust reg. in Ruggell, Liechtenstein. His BA thesis was one of the first to reproduce the quantitative rating models of leading credit rating agencies, and to set these rating models in relation to the associated CDS spreads. ‘One of the results of this BA thesis consists in the fact that the quantitative rating models are a very effective instrument for registering the long-term, and even short-term credit risks of nations. This is an important finding, which has great practical use for players on the Liechtenstein financial market,’ commented Professor Marco Menichetti, underlining the relevance of the thesis.



From left to right: Professor Marco J. Menichetti, of the Faculty of Business Administration, Banking and Financial Management of the University of Liechtenstein; prizewinner Radovan Studník, MSc;  prizewinner Michael J. Weiser, BSc; Simon Tribelhorn, Managing Director of the Liechtenstein Banking Association.


Radovan Studník received the prize for his thesis on the MA course in Banking and Financial Management (a Master in Finance course since September 2014). Since completing his studies in August 2014 he has been working as an analyst in the Asset Management department of ZZ Vermögensberatung AG [ZZ Asset Management Consultancy plc], a Family Office in Vitznau, Switzerland. His MA thesis discusses methods of securing investment portfolios by focusing on currencies with a low rate of fluctuation. He was able to demonstrate that developing and industrial countries show a yield anomaly in relation to the low rate of volatility. ‘His findings provide further valuable indications which will be useful for optimising global investment portfolios, and so should be highly interesting for financial brokers in Liechtenstein,’ was Simon Tribelhorn’s assessment of the prizewinning thesis.


Keynote speech on the European supervisory system
Deputy CEO Robert Priester, Head of the Wholesale & Regulatory Policy Department of the European Banking Federation (EBF), Brussels, attended the prizegiving and gave an address on the subject of ‘European Supervisory Structures – Challenges and Past Experience’. His observations focused on the new role of the European Central Bank (ECB). On 4 November 2014 the ECB, as part of the Single Supervisory Mechanism or SSM for short, took on responsibility for supervision of European banks. The main objectives of the SSM are to ensure the security and solidity of the European banking system and improve financial integration and stability in Europe generally. 120 of the most important banking groups will now be subject to the direct supervision of the ECB. Based on the sum of their assets, this amounts to 82% of the banking sector in the euro zone. The ECB formulates supervisory standards for the remaining 3500 banks, and checks for compliance.



Keynote speaker Deputy CEO Robert Priester of the European Banking Federation (EBF)