Christine Zhuowei Huang

Christine Zhuowei Huang, Zhuowei Huang, Christine Huang, finance PhD, UTD, UT Dallas, University of Texas at Dallas
Ph.D. Candidate in Finance
Naveen Jindal School of Management
The University of Texas at Dallas
zhuowei.huang@utdallas.edu

About Me

I am a Ph.D. candidate in finance at the University of Texas at Dallas. I am on the 2025-2026 academic job market.

Research Interests

Working Papers

  1. Green Neighbors, Greener Neighborhoods: Peer Effects in Green Home Investments  [Job Market Paper]
    PDF SSRN
    Abstract: Utilizing a nearest-neighbor research design, I find that households exposed to green neighbors within 0.1 miles are 1.6 times more likely to make their homes green within a year than unexposed households. The exposure also increases the likelihood of multi-property owners certifying their faraway secondary properties green, emphasizing that information from neighbors, not neighborhood characteristics alone, drives the effect. While financial benefits including green home prices, electricity savings, and regulatory incentives strengthen peer effects, pro-environmental preferences do not. An information-cost-based discrete choice model explains the findings and suggests that incorporating peer effect metrics in subsidies may accelerate green home investments.
    Upcoming Presentations: EUROFIDAI-ESSEC Paris December 2025 Finance Meeting, AFA 2026 PhD Student Poster
    Awards: 3rd European Sustainable Finance PhD Workshop Best Paper, ABFER 12th Annual Conference Best Poster (1st Runner-up), Semifinalist for 2024 FMA Annual Meeting Best Paper, 14th Financial Markets and Corporate Governance Conference PhD Symposium Best Paper
    Selected Presentations: NFA 2025, AEA 2025 (Poster), New York Fed and NYU Summer Climate Finance Conference (Poster), ABFER 12th Annual Conference (Poster), European Winter Finance Conference (EWFC) 2025, Seminar at San Francisco Fed, 1st Zurich–Oxford Doctoral Symposium on Real Estate Markets, CEPR-ESSEC-Luxembourg Conference on Sustainable Financial Intermediation, 2025 Baruch-JFQA Climate Finance and Sustainability Conference (Poster), 2nd Women in Central Banking Workshop at Dallas Fed (Poster), 3rd CEMLA/Dallas Fed/IBEFA Financial Stability Workshop, 2024 Boulder Summer Conference on Consumer Financial Decision Making (Poster), IWFSAS 2024 at UBC Sauder, 2024 CEMA Annual Conference at Boston University, FMA 2025 Doctoral Student Consortium.

  2. How Do Debt Collection Restrictions Affect Hospitals and Patients?
    SSRN
    With Amit Kumar and Lynn Linghuan Wang
    Abstract: Tighter regulations on consumer debt collectors, although intended to curb predatory practices, may disrupt industries to which such debts are owed. Using a paired-county stacked difference-in-differences design, we show that these regulations adversely affect hospitals. While hospital patient volume remains unchanged, their accounts receivable, liabilities, and profitability deteriorate, with stronger effects for ex-ante higher financial liability and debt collector density. Hospitals respond by reducing capacity, employment, and care quality, and by steering patients to high-cost procedures. Additionally, non-profit hospitals reduce charity care for uninsured patients. Overall, ignoring spillovers of consumer financial protection laws on non-financial sectors may overstate their benefits.
    Presentations: University of Texas at Dallas, University of Washington*, Arizona State University*, Georgetown University*, Cornell University*, Boston University*, University of Iowa*, University of Georgia*, Georgia Institute of Technology*, Singapore Management University*

  3. Banking on Education: How Credit Shocks Shape Universities and Student Outcomes
    With Han Xia
    Abstract: Many public and private universities in the U.S. rely on debt to finance operations. While the recent literature examines the rising burden from student loans, institutional borrowing has received less attention. We study how shocks to credit availability and borrowing costs affect universities and their students. Focusing on one form of institutional borrowing—bank loans, and exploiting the staggered implementation of bank stress tests as a plausibly exogenous shock to credit supply, we show that constrained access to credit leads universities to raise tuition while cutting spending on teaching and research. This effect varies by institutional type. Teaching-oriented (or public) universities significantly increase tuition and reduce research spending, whereas research-oriented (or private) institutions preserve tuition levels and moderately cut teaching expenditures. Students enrolled in affected universities borrow more student debt to afford education. They face a higher likelihood of defaulting and experience slower earnings growth after graduation. Our findings suggest that bank credit shocks can significantly affect higher education and carry implications for the recent discussions about tightening higher education funding.

  4. Employing Undocumented Workers: Immigration Enforcement Impacts on Small Businesses And The Role of Bank Monitoring
    SSRN
    With Amit Kumar and Jiajie Xu
    Abstract: Using the staggered rollout of the Secure Communities program as shocks to undocumented labor supply, we show that the non-tradable and construction sectors in affected counties experienced higher wages, formal employment, and firm closures—indicating that firms previously relied on undocumented workers and subsequently substituted them with costlier formal labor. Small business-level data reveal that rising formal employment and closures were stronger among unbanked firms. Even among firms with banking relationships, those facing ex-ante weaker local bank monitoring exhibited stronger effects. Overall, these patterns suggest a deputization-like effect of bank screening and monitoring in deterring borrowers from employing undocumented workers.
    Presentations: FMA Annual Meeting 2025 New Ideas Session, Asia-Pacific Corporate Finance Online Workshop.

    5. * presented by coauthors

Awards and Fellowships

AFA PhD Student Travel Grant, 2026
Northern Finance Association PhD Travel Funds, 2025
European Finance Association Travel Grant, 2024
JSOM Dean's Excellence Scholarship for Current Students, University of Texas at Dallas, 2024–2026
Doctoral Student Scholarship, University of Texas at Dallas, 2019–2024
Graduate Research Fellowship, University of Texas at Dallas, 2020–2021

Teaching

Instructor
FIN 3320 Business Finance - Summer 2023, Spring 2024

Teaching Assistant
FIN 4300 Investment Management - Fall 2021, 2022, 2023
FIN 3350 Financial Markets and Institutions - Spring 2022, 2023
FIN 6325 Macroeconomics and Financial Markets - Spring 2022, 2023
FIN 6360 Derivatives Markets - Fall 2022
FIN 4340 Options and Futures Markets - Fall 2022
FIN 6368 Financial Information and Analysis - Fall 2021
REAL 6321 Introduction to Real Estate - Fall 2021
REAL 3305 Real Estate Principles - Fall 2021
FIN 6353 Financial Modeling for Investment Analysis - Spring 2020
FIN 6318 Analytics of Finance - Spring 2020
FIN 4310 Intermediate Financial Management - Spring 2020
MECO 6312 Applied Econometrics and Time Series Analysis - Fall 2019

Contact

Address: 800 W Campbell Rd JSOM II, Richardson, TX 75080
Email: zhuowei.huang@utdallas.edu