Ana Carmen Díaz, researcher at Orkestra’s Energy Department received the Accésit (second prize) for her PhD Thesis “Essays on Management Fees of the Spanish Mutual Fund Industry” during the national call of the PhD Thesis Awards of the University of Cantabria and Banco Santander for the Study and Research of the Financial Sector (UCEIF Foundation).

It is an essay focused on analysing the management fees charged by managing companies to investment fund investors. Therefore, it compares the group of funds that establish the management fees regarding the result obtained by the fund with the group of funds that receive the management fees regarding the equity managed by the fund. The final aim of the PhD thesis is to analyse the characteristics of the funds themselves that determine the choice of this sort of fees, the changes made to both the amount and type of the latter, management evaluation and the relation between the expenses charged to the investor and the profitability offered to the investor in the two groups of funds.

Ana Carmen received the award at a ceremony chaired by Federico Gutiérrez Solana, rector of the University of Cantabria, Carlos Hazas, assistant deputy general director of the Region of Cantabria and Francisco Javier Martínez García, general director of the UCEIF Foundation and which took place at the UCEIF headquarters in Santander.

Ana Carmen Díaz

Ana Carmen Díaz has a PhD in Economy by the University of the Basque Country. She is currently working for the energy department where she develops projects related with the economic impact of energy and its contribution to the national economy, and the energy costs in industrial companies. Previously, she had worked as professor and research assistant in the Department of Economic Analysis Basics II and as professor in the Department of Applied Economy V at the University of the Basque Country. Likewise, she has also stayed at other universities such as the Universidad Complutense and the University Carlos III in Madrid.