Dr. Omar Farooq, Ph.D.

Professor of Finance
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Dr. Omar Farooq holds the position of Professor of Finance at the UGSM-Monarch School of Business Switzerlnd. He started his career as Assistant Professor of Finance at the Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane, Morocco. Currently, he is also employed as Associate Professor of Finance at the Aalborg University, Denmark.

Dr. Farooq’s current research focuses on corporate governance mechanisms in emerging markets, performance of analyst recommendations, and microfinance. His research work has been accepted for presentation in some of the reputed conferences such as Asian Finance Association (AFA) Conference, Midwest Finance Association (MFA) Conference, International Conference on Corporate Governance, International Finance Corporation (IFC) Conference, Eastern Finance Association (EFA), Multinational Finance Society, and Financial Management Association (FMA) Conference.

Dr. Farooq has also been involved in teaching a number of courses, such as Principles of Finance, Corporate Financial Management, Financial Investments, Corporate Finance, Advanced Corporate Finance (Investment Valuation), Capital Budgeting, Corporate Governance, and Methods in Empirical Research at the graduate and the undergraduate level at the Aalborg University (Denmark), the Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration (Finland) and the Al Akhawayn University (Morocco). He has also conducted some of these courses for part-time MBA and executive MBA programs at the Al Akhawayn University, Morocco.

Academic Positions Held
  • Professor of Economics, UGSM-Monarch Business School
  • Associate Professor of Finance, Aalborg University, Denmark
  • Assistant Professor of Finance, Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane, Morocco
Academic Credentials
  • Ph.D. Financial Economics, Hanken School of Economics, Helsinki, Finland
  • MS. E-Commerce/E-Business, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA
  • BS. Electronics Engineering, GIK Institute of Engineering Sciences and Technology, Pakistan
Grants And Honors
  • Hanken Foundation Grant
  • Yrjo Jahsnnonin Grant
Main Academic Interests
  • Corporate Governance in Emerging Markets
  • Corporate Finance
  • Performance of Analyst Recommendations
  • Microfinance
Memberships
  • Member, ACBSP-Accreditation Council For Business Schools & Programs, USA
  • Member, ECBE-European Council For Business Education, Switzerland
Selected and Recent Publications
  • Farooq, O. and Benali, M., (2012). Earnings Management Behavior of the Initial Public Offering (IPO) Firms during Pre-IPO, IPO, and Post-IPO Years: Evidence from the Casablanca Stock Exchange. Forthcoming, African Journal of Business Management.
  • Farooq, O. and El Jai, H., (2012). Ownership Structure and Earnings Management: Evidence from the Casablanca Stock Exchange. International Research Journal of Finance and Economics, 84, pp. 95-105.
  • Farooq, O. and Derrabi, M., (2012). Effect of Corporate Governance Mechanisms on the Relationship between Legal Origins and Cost of Debt: Evidence from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Region. African Journal of Business Management, 6(7), pp. 2706-2715.
  • Farooq, O., Saoud, S., and Agnaou, S., (2012). Dividend Policy as a Ssignaling Mechanism in Different Growth Periods: Evidence from the Casablanca Stock Exchange. International Research Journal of Finance and Economics, 83, pp. 187-198.
  • Farooq, O. and Kacemi, Y., (2011). Ownership Concentration, Choice of Auditors, and Firm Performance: Evidence from the MENA Region. Review of Middle East Economics and Finance, 7(2).
  • Farooq, O. and El Attari, A., (2009). Can Individual/Naive Investors Infer Valuable Information from Institutional Investors’ Trades? Evidence from the Casablanca Stock Exchange. Review of Middle East Economics and Finance, 5(1).
  • Farooq, O. and Ahmed, S., (2008). The Effect of 9/11 on the Stock Market Volatility Dynamics: Empirical Evidence from a Front Line State. International Research Journal of Finance and Economics, 16, pp. 71-83.
Papers Accepted In Conferences
  • Does geographic proximity leads to superior performance of local analysts? Evidence from an emerging market – 19th Annual Meeting of the Multinational Finance Society, Krakow, Poland (June 24, 2012 – June 27, 2012)
  • Do governance reforms always increase informativeness of analysts’ recommendations? Evidence from a newly emerging market – 18th Annual Meeting of the Multinational Finance Society, Rome, Italy (June 26, 2011 – June 29, 2011)
  • Pre and post-crisis analysis of home bias in analysts’ recommendations: Evidence from Asian Emerging Markets – Asian Finance Association Conference, Bangkok, Thailand (June 29, 2010 – July 02, 2010)
  • Corporate governance and standard deviation of analysts’ recommendations: Pre- and post-crisis analysis from Asian emerging markets – Asian Finance Association Conference, Bangkok, Thailand (June 29, 2010 – July 02, 2010)
  • Effect of media independence on dividend policy: Evidence from emerging stock markets – Asian Finance Association Conference, Bangkok, Thailand (June 29, 2010 – July 02, 2010)
  • Effect of media independence on dividend policy: Evidence from emerging stock markets – Eastern Finance Association (EFA) Conference, Miami, USA (April 14, 2010 – April 17, 2010)
  • Do governance reforms always increase informativeness of analysts’ recommendations? Evidence from a newly emerging market – Asian Institute of Corporate Governance and Global Corporate Governance Forum’s International Conference on Corporate Governance, Istanbul, Turkey (November 16, 2007 – November 17, 2007)
  • Who was informative? Performance of foreign and local analysts’ stock recommendations during Asian financial crisis – Asian Finance Association Conference, Hong Kong (July 4, 2007 – July 7, 2007)
  • Do governance reforms always increase informativeness of analysts’ recommendations? Evidence from a newly emerging market – 5th International Conference on Corporate Governance – Shareholders and Other Stakeholders, Birmingham, UK (July 2, 2007)
  • Did governance reforms have had any impact on the relative performance foreign and local analysts in the crisis-hit Asian countries? – 5th International Conference on Corporate Governance: Shareholders and Other Stakeholders, Birmingham, UK (July 2, 2007)
  • Do analysts issue recommendations to balance the book? Evidence from Helsinki Stock Exchange
    (Old Title 1: Do analysts revise their recommendations to increase their clients’ trading? Old Title 2: The tail wagging the dog? – Do trading imbalances impact analyst’s recommendations?) – Financial Management Association (FMA) Conference, Barcelona, Spain (May 30, 2007 – June 1, 2007)
  • Who was informative? Performance of foreign and local analysts’ stock recommendations during Asian financial crisis – Midwest Finance Association (MFA) Conference, Minneapolis, USA (March 21, 2007 – March 24, 2007)
  • Who was informative? Performance of foreign and local analysts’ stock recommendations during Asian financial crisis – Campus for Finance Conference, Vallendar, Germany (January 10, 2007 – January 11, 2007)