Awarded Theses

Bild BAI
BAI Science Award 2024 of the Bundesverband Alternative Investments e.V.

Markus Bilz has won the BAI Science Award with his master thesis "Improving Option Trade Classification
With Machine Learning". 

BAI Science Award 2023 of the Bundesverband Alternative Investments e.V.

Louis Skowronek has won the BAI Science Award of the Bundesverband Alternative Investments e.V. with his bachelor thesis "Machine Learning and the Prices of Cryptocurrencies".

Study Award of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation 2022

Matthias Molnar has won the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation 2022 Study Award with his master's thesis "Understanding Biases in Option Returns - A Simulative Approach". The prize was awarded to him together with the other prize winners on May 11, 2023 as part of the Ernst Blickle Lecture at the Customer Center of SEW-Eurodrive GmbH & Co. KG in Graben-Neudorf.

Bild SEW-Eurodrive-Stiftung
Matthias Molnar at the award ceremony for the SEW Eurodrive Foundation 2022 study prize
Bild KIT
Daniel Wiswesser at the presentation of the Sparkassen-Environment-Price 2021
Sparkassen-Environment-Prize 2021

The master thesis "Measuring European CO2 Policy Uncertainty and its Impact on Financial Markets" by Daniel Wiswesser has been nominated and accepted for the Sparkassen-Environment-Prize 2021. The prize was awarded to him at a ceremony on July 4, 2022.

BAI Science Award 2021 of the Bundesverband Alternative Investments e.V.

Johannes Dinger has won the BAI Science Award of the Bundesverband Alternative Investments e.V. with his master thesis "Sources Behind the Variance Risk Premium on German Treasury Bond Markets".

Research Award of the Swiss Derivative Awards 2021

Johannes Dinger has won the 2. Prize of the Research Awards of the Swiss Derivative Aweards 2021 with his bachelor thesis "Sources behind the Variance Risk Premium on German Government Bond Markets".

Study Award of the SEW -EURODRIVE Foundation 2020

Caroline Grauer has won the Study Award of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation 2020 with her master's thesis "Capital requirements and option returns".

BAI Science Award 2020 of the German Alternative Investments Association

Katharina Reiff has won the BAI Science Award of the Bundesverband Alternative Investments e.V. with her master thesis "Comparison of different methods for calculating option returns in a simulation study".

Faculty Award 2020 of the KIT Faculty of Economics

The master thesis with the title "Inventory Effects on Option Prices: An Empirical Analysis Using U.S. Intraday Data" by Niklas Grammig was awarded the Faculty Award 2020 by the KIT Faculty of Economics.

BAI-Science Prize 2018 of the Bundesverband Alternative Investments e.V.

Karol Schenk's bachelor's thesis "Short-term forecasting of stock returns through option data" was awarded the BAI Science Prize of the Bundesverband Alternative Investments e.V. Timo Herrmann was awarded in the category Master Theses for his Master Thesis "Energy policy uncertainty: A real and financial economic risk? Empirical Analysis for Germany".

Bild
Timo Herrmann at the presentation of the BAI-Science Prize 2018 of the Bundesverband Alternative Investments e.V.
Faculty Award 2018 of the KIT Faculty of Economics

Timo Hermann's master's thesis entitled "Energy Political Uncertainty: A Real and Financial Economic Risk?" was awarded the Faculty Prize 2018 by the KIT Faculty of Economics.

Bild
Timo Herrmann at the presentation of the 2018 Faculty Award of the KIT Faculty of Economics
Swiss Derivative Awards 2018

The master's thesis "Applying Blockchain to OTC Derivatives" by Adili Yiligeer was awarded second place at the Swiss Derivative Awards 2018. The practical work with focus convinced the jury with its application questions of the block chain in a post-trade environment.

Bild
Adili Yiligeer (2nd from left) at the Swiss Derivatives Awards 2018
Study Prize 2017 of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation

As part of the high-caliber Ernst Blickle Award ceremony, the Executive Board of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation presented 18 young scientists with the study prize, which is endowed with €2,500 each. Paolo Manzano received the award for his master's thesis "Pricing of Corporate Bond Market Liquidity Across Market Phases".

Bild
Study Prize 2017 of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation
Study Prize 2016 of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation

As part of the high-caliber Ernst Blickle Award ceremony, the Executive Board of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation awarded 23 young scientists with the study prize, which is endowed with 2,500 euros each. Michael Reichenbacher was awarded the prize for his master's thesis "Variance and Kurtosis Risk in Energy Markets: Implications on Risk and Wealth Management".

Bild
Study Prize 2016 of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation
Faculty Award 2015 of the KIT Faculty of Economics

Philip Flück's master's thesis entitled "Pricing of liquidity risk in the U.S. corporate bond market" was awarded the Faculty Award 2015 by the KIT Faculty of Economics.

Swiss Derivative Awards 2016

The master's thesis "Filtered historical Simulation for Portfolios: Model Selection and Calibration" by Andreas Höcherl was awarded first place at the Swiss Derivative Awards 2016.

Bild
Andreas Höcherl at the Swiss Derivative Awards 2016
BAI Science Prize 2015 of the German Federal Association of Alternative Investments

Julian Hess has won the BAI-Wissenschatpreis of the Bundesverband Alternative Investments e.V. for his diploma thesis "Relative-Value Arbitrage in European Energy Commodity Markets".

Maravon Markets Award 2015

Philip Flück has won the Maravon Markets Award with his master thesis "Pricing of liquidity risk in the US corporate bond market".

Bild
Maravon Markets Award 2015
DAI Prize 2013 of Deutsches Aktieninstitut

Martin Brosig was awarded the University Prize of the Deutsches Aktieninstitut for his master thesis entitled "Empirical Investigation of Information Efficiency on the VIX-/VIX-Futures Market".

Bild
DAI Prize 2013 of Deutsches Aktieninstitut
2012 Study Prize of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation

As part of the high-caliber Ernst Blickle lecture, the Executive Board of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation awarded 21 young scientists with the study prize, each worth €2,500. Tanja Siegrist received the award for her thesis "CDO valuation using dynamic Copula models".

Bild
2012 Study Prize of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation
Faculty Award of the Faculty of Economic Sciences 2011

Thomas Schön is the winner of the Faculty Award 2011 and his diploma thesis on "Determining the default intensity dynamics of individual debtors in top-down approaches" deals with the valuation of structured credit derivatives.

Heinrich Hertz Prize 2010

Christian Schön won the Heinrich Hertz Prize for Business Mathematics 2010 with his thesis on "Estimating Implied Portfolio Default Intensities from iTraxx Tranches".

Study Award 2010 of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation

SEW-EURODRIVE is one of the leading international companies in drive engineering. The SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation particularly promotes the development, consolidation and advancement of scientific knowledge in the fields of technology and business and honors outstanding achievements by students and scientists. In 2010, Philipp Schuster received an award for his diploma thesis in the Industrial Engineering and Management program on the topic "Time Structure of Liquidity Spreads".

Bild
Study Award 2010 of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation
Faculty Award of the Faculty of Economic Sciences 2009

Stefan Helber received an award for his diploma thesis in the Industrial Engineering and Management course on the topic of "Valuation of CDO tranches using top-down approaches". In it, he deals with a form of credit derivative that has been perceived by a broader public at least since the outbreak of the current financial crisis - the so-called collateralized debt obligations. On the question currently being discussed in research and practice as to which valuation approach should be chosen for CDOs, the thesis analyses an innovative modelling approach - the top-down approach - and adapts it to market data, which is an extremely challenging problem from both a methodological and economic point of view.

GAUSS Young Talent Award 2008

The Gauss Prize of the German Society for Actuarial and Financial Mathematics (DGVFM) and the German Association of Actuaries (DAV) is considered the highest national award in the field of applied research in financial and actuarial mathematics. The award winner in 2008 is Dipl.-Wirtschaftsmathematiker Daniel Müller with his thesis "Modeling and Valuation of Credit Derivatives with Lévy Processes".

Bild
GAUSS Young Talent Award 2008
Faculty Award of the Faculty of Economics 2008

Daniel Stock received an award for his diploma thesis in industrial engineering and management on the subject of "Rating CDOs with Moody's BET model". In it, he discusses the central function and structure of a rating system and evaluates the effectiveness of the BET model developed by the rating agency Moody's using a CDO example structure.

Werner von Siemens Excellence Award 2006

With its award, Siemens AG honors outstanding diploma and master's theses that were written as part of a technical or scientific course of study and contribute with excellent results to the solution of future-oriented problems. In addition to scientific achievement, the degree of innovation of the ideas submitted and their practical feasibility were evaluated. Kevin Zander received the award for his diploma thesis on "Regime Switching and Principal Component Analysis for the Modelling of Electricity Prices", which he wrote in the Industrial Engineering and Management course. In it, he discusses and investigates a new type of model for the spot electricity price - the regime switching models - with the aim of mapping spot prices on an hourly basis.

Study Prize 2005 of the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation

SEW-EURODRIVE is one of the leading international companies in drive engineering. The SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation particularly promotes the development, consolidation and advancement of scientific knowledge in the fields of technology and business and honors outstanding achievements by students and scientists. In 2005, Christopher Hollensteiner received an award for his diploma thesis in the Industrial Engineering and Management course on the topic of "Collateralized Debt Obligations - Structural Analysis and Pricing".

GAUSS Young Talent Award 2005

The Gauss Prize of the German Society for Actuarial and Financial Mathematics (DGVFM) and the German Association of Actuaries (DAV) is considered the highest national award in the field of applied research in financial and actuarial mathematics. In 2005, the award winner was Dipl. Wi.-Ing. Philipp Koziol with his thesis "Analysis of the default probabilities generated by Copulas and their effects on risk management".