GSEM UrFU Researchers Won a Grant from the Russian Foundation for Basic Research

16:10, July 30, 2020

The competition topic was «Basic problems of coronavirus epidemics emergence and spread»

The competition aims to support research that focuses on basic findings about topical issues outlined by the Foundation (RFBR) and essential for facing global challenges.

The Foundation supports projects implemented from 01.07.2020 to 30.06.2022 with the maximum amount of support being 6 million RUB for each stage of the project.

The competition Viruses with the topic “Basic problems of coronavirus epidemics emergence and spread” received 561 applications, the experts chose 109 projects to support.

We would like to congratulate the research team lead by GSEM Prof. Dr. Hans Wiesmeth on winning the competition and getting grant support from RFBR. The topic of his team’s project is “Pandemic and mass hysteria. Influence and negative impact mitigation on the stock market”.

The economists under the leadership of Professof at TU Dresden Ostap Okhrin and Senior Researcher at GSEM UrFU Hans Wiesmeth will try to find out what had a bigger impact on the stock market – the coronavirus pandemic or mass hysteria caused by it. The research will include the Russian stock market, as well as the biggest markets in the world. The research is conducted jointly with Ufa State Aviation Technical University.

«The motivation for our research is the emergence of the coronavirus pandemic in December 2019 on the one hand, and on the other hand it was the hysteria that followed and stock markets collapse in January and February 2020, the biggest one since the 1998 crisis », — says Alexamder Nepp, co-author of the research, Associate Professor of the Academic Department of International Economics and Management.

The researchers believe that the stock markets collapse was caused not so much by the pandemic itself, but by the mass hysteria triggered by the Internet and media.

«Based on the findings, we are going to develop the mechanisms of coronavirus and hysteria effects on stock markets as predictors of economic development. This is the practical dimension of our project. Besides, we are planning to elaborate some recommendations on how to mitigate these negative effects, — commented Yulia Egorova, one of the research co-authors, Associate Professor of Ufa State Aviation Technical University. — We will also try to answer the question connected with the role of Internet freedom in creating negative impact on stock markets in different countries».

The researchers are convinced that their findings will be useful not only during the coronavirus pandemic. The contribution of basic research into the fight against infectious coronaviruses is going to grow very fast as the current COVID-19 pandemic is not the first: it was preceded by SARS and MERS. There are also prognoses for the COVID-19 second wave, possible mutations and the constant threat of other infectious viruses epidemics. 

We wish the research teams success in their endeavours!