Research seminars
The research seminars organized by the subject Accounting bring together researchers, students and practitioners to discuss research and issues broadly related to accounting, finance, governance and sustainability. We have different seminar formats depending on the guest, audience and the collaboration. We have a traditional brown bag seminar that we typically run together with the finance subject at Hanken. Then we have the Helsinki Accounting Seminar organized together with Aalto Business School. Finally, we have the successful Accounting for Sustainability seminar which focuses on issues related to ESG investing and reporting, as well as the practice of sustainability accounting.
Our faculty has also a successfully organized large-scale and small-scale international conferences and workshops, such as the JAAF Conference, FRAP Conference and our own Botnia Accounting & Auditing Seminar.
Organized in 2025
11.11.2025, Mo'Tasem Abudalou, University of Sussex Business School
Transparency and Bank Risk: Evidence from U.S. Public and Private Banks
Authors: Mo’Tasem Abudalou, Gonul Colak, Samuel Fosu
23.10.2025, Niclas Meyer
Insider Trading Around Environmental Lawsuits
Authors: Mansoor Afzali, Gonul Colak, Niclas Meyer
21.10.2025, Dennis Sundvik, Accounting Flash Seminar
21.10.2025, Jukka Kettunen, Copenhagen Business School
“Green transition disclosure laws and plant assets”
Jukka Kettunen and Gonul Colak
15.10.2025, Moderator: Sohaib Ahmed, Reading group
Discussing the paper:
“Text as Data in Economic Analysis“
Hassan et al. (2025), Journal of Economic Perspectives 39 (3): 193–220.
14.10.2025, Aaron Afzali
“The assurance costs of mandatory sustainability reporting: Preliminary evidence from the CSRD”
Authors: Aaron Afzali, Mansoor Afzali, Henry Jarva
9.10.2025, David Hay, University of Auckland & Gilad Livne, Queen Mary University of London Helsinki Accounting Research Seminar
Editor's Panel: Gilad Livne & David Hay
8.10.2025, Gilad Livne, Queen Mary University of London, Helsinki Accounting Research Seminar “The Impact of the FRC Audit Inspection Program on Audit Effort and Audit Fees”
7.10.2025, Othmar Lehner, Accounting Flash Seminar
23.9.2025, Kim Ittonen, Accounting Flash Seminar
9.9.2025, Hanna Silvola, Accounting Flash Seminar
4.9.2025, Georgious Voulgaris, Alliance Manchester Business School, Research Seminar
22.8.2025, Sean Cao, University of Maryland, Vaasa Accounting Seminar
“AI and Fintech research”
20.8.2025, Bjørn Jørgensen, CBS/ Hanken, Research Seminar
Popular Research Questions in Accounting
20.5.2025, Tra Tham, Brown Bag Seminar
Key Audit Matters in Climate Risk Reporting: Enhancing Assurance and Regulatory Compliance.
Authors: Tra Tham, Othmar Lehner
16.4.2025, Moderator Dennis Sundvik, Accounting Research Seminar for Doctoral Researchers in Vaasa
Presenters: Mingjian Li, Sumon Das
8.4.2025 Moderator Mansoor Afzali Reading group
Discussing the paper:
“Out of Control: The (Over) Use of Controls in Accounting Research”
18.3.2025, Moderator Jaana Kettunen, Reading group
Journal review process: Case “Earnings management in local government healthcare reporting: Financial distress vs. peer influence?“
11.3.2025, Moderator Piia Korri, Reading group
Presenting work in progress
18.2.2025, Moderator: Sohaib Ahmed, Reading group
Discussion about the concept of Endogeneity in Accounting Research
13.2.2025, Timmy Thor, Defense of Doctoral Thesis in Accounting
Timmy Thor will defend his doctoral thesis.
Essays on the Role of Corporate Culture in Accounting and Finance
Opponent: Professor Vasiliki Athanasakou, Saint Mary's University
Custos: Associate Professor Dennis Sundvik, Hanken School of Economics
11.2.2025, Moderator: Mingjian Li, Reading group
Discussion about the paper
“Baik et al., JAE 2024: Vocal Delivery Quality in Earnings Conference Calls”
7.1.2025, Qinglan Huang, Defense of Doctoral Thesis in Accounting
Qinglan Huang will defend her doctoral thesis.
Exploring Mandatory Sustainability Reporting in China: Economic Implications and Regulatory Effectiveness
Opponent: Professor Gunnar Rimmel, Aalborg University Business School
Custos: Associate Professor Hanna Silvola, Hanken School of Economics
Organized in 2024
5, December, 2024: Orthodoxia Kyriacou Middlesex University London
Accounting for Sustainability seminar: "Breaking the chains and framing the links: How Big 4 accounting firms normalize modern slavery"
22, October, 2024: Bjørn N. Jørgensen CBS and Hanken
Helsinki Accounting Seminar: “Do accounting standards affect financial statements? Evidence from firms with twin financial statements
(coauthored with Brian Burnett and Sumair Hussain)”
@ Futurum and Teams
Co-organized with Aalto Business School
21, October, 2024: Bjørn N. Jørgensen CBS and Hanken
PhD Seminar on Job Market Paper Abstracts
@ Futurum and Teams
10, October, 2024: Emilio Marti Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University
Accounting for Sustainability seminar: "Relying on other stakeholders to make companies more sustainable: Ethnographic insights from a shareholder engagement fund"
29, August, 2024: Helsinki Accounting and Auditing Mini-Conference
Jointly with Aalto Business School
Co-chair: Kim Ittonen
26-27, August, 2024: 2024 Botnia Accounting & Auditing Seminar
Keynote speaker: Linda Myers, University of Tennessee, Knoxwille
Chair: Dennis Sundvik
29, May, 2024: Marco Trombetta, IE University
Helsinki Accounting Seminar: Breakfast session with Marco Trombetta, Editor-in-Chief, of the Journal of Accounting and Public Policy
Co-organized with Aalto Business School
28, May, 2024: Dennis Sundvik, Hanken
"Audit adjustments and financial reporting quality in private firms"
@D401
23, May, 2024: Jan Bebbington Lancaster University
Accounting for Sustainability seminar: "Accounting infrastructures for biodiversity outcomes"
13, May, 2024: Pirta Wentzel, Hanken
“When management controls make the rules for innovation: two case studies of established firms’ R&D activities”
13:00-14:00 @ D401
2, May, 2024: Milda Tylaite, Stockholm School of Economics
“The Choice of Accounting Standards under Competing Tax and External Reporting Preferences: Evidence from Intangible Asset Reporting in Small Private Firms”
13:00-14:00 @ v142/Vasa and Teams
20, March, 2024: Qinglan Huang, Hanken
“Exploring Mandatory Sustainability Reporting in China: Economic Implications and Regulatory Effectiveness”
@ D401 and Teams
18, March, 2024: Thorsten Sellhorn, LMU Munich School of Management
Helsinki Accounting Seminar: “Climate disclosure in financial statements”
Co-organized with Aalto Business School
8, February, 2024: Kris Hardies, University of Antwerp
Helsinki Accounting Seminar: “The Importance of Audit Partners in Explaining Audit Outcomes: A Stylized Fact?”
Co-organized with Aalto Business School
Organized in 2023
4, November, 2023: Aaron Afzali, Hanken
Doctoral defense in Accounting: “Essays on the impact of board composition on financial reporting quality, corporate social responsibility, and tournament incentives”
Opponent and university: Professor Gilad Livne, University of Bristol, United Kingdom
Chair: Professor Kim Ittonen, Hanken School of Economics, Finland
7, December, 2023: Sabine Dörry, Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER)
Accounting for Sustainability seminar: “Linking alternative economies and sustainable finance with regional development: the examples of France, Germany and Luxembourg.”
25, October, 2023: Aaron Afzali, Hanken
“The Impact of Relative CEO Pay on Employee Productivity”, co-authored with Lars Oxelheim; Trond Randøy; and João Paulo Vieito
4, October, 2023: Eija Vinnari, University of Tampere
Accounting for Sustainability seminar: “Accounting, accountability and animals: negotiating the promises and pitfalls of quantification.”
6, September, 2023: Katharina Fellnhofer, ETH Zürich
Hosted by the Finance department/ Emilia Vähämaa
“Investor intuition promotes gender equality in access to finance.”
28, August, 2023: Clara Zhou, Maquarie University
Hosted by the Finance department/ Jesper Haga
“Green Reckoning in the ESG Landscape: Unveiling Reputational Penalties for Environmental Violations”
21, August, 2023: Sean Cao, University of Maryland
“An overview of the research on AI and disclosure”
28-31, May, 2023: Journal of Accounting, Auditing & Finance Conference 2023
Chair: Kim Ittonen
24, May, 2023: David Cabreros Gonzalez University of Valladolid
Hosted by the Finance department/ Emilia Vähämaa
“Boards, CEO overconfidence and ESG: A two-fold perspective distinguishing between good and bad practices.”
23, May, 2023: Gilad Livne, University of Bristol
“Does the Market React to the Textual Properties of M&A Conference Calls?”
23, May, 2023: Othmar Lehner, Hanken
Accounting for Sustainability seminar: “Developing Political Theory Performativity: An Agential Realism Perspective on Social and Environmental Accounting”
17, March, 2023: Ali Nickpour, Aalto University School of Business
“Big 4 audit partners’ political activism and audit quality.”
9, March, 2023: Paolo Quattrone, Alliance Manchester Business School
Accounting for Sustainability seminar: “Beyond Transparency? Common Good and Value-Added Planning and Budgeting at the Istituto per la Ricostruzione Industriale (IRI)”
21, February, 2023: Janicke Rasmussen, BI Norwegian Business School
“Accounting (performance) on the slippery slope: using CEOs as scapegoats to fix investor disenchantment”
2, February, 2023: Guillermo Badía, University of Deusto
Hosted by the Finance department/ Emilia Vähämaa
“Behavioural finance in sustainable finance: could socially responsible investors be more rational than conventional ones?”
21, March, 2023: Lee Parker Adam Smith Business School, The University of Glasgow
Accounting for Sustainability seminar: “Third sector crisis management & resilience: messages for accountability & sustainability"
18, January, 2023: Shipeng Yan, University of Hong Kong
Accounting for Sustainability seminar: “Religious investors and corporate decarbonization"
12, January, 2023: Mikael Homanen, PRI
Accounting for Sustainability seminar: “Which Institutional Investors Drive Corporate Sustainability?”