Rizwana Akbar

COMMENTS:

SLIDE 2: This is good -- states the problem clearly. It is not good in format -- long sentences instead of short bullets == rewrite as:

  • Oil is crucial input in production activities of most firms

  • Literature shows Oil Prices impact negatively on stock returns (sources)

Goal of my research: study impacts of oil prices on stocks (or some such)

Instead of bland and uninformative titles like Introduction, one should try to pack information into every word. Title of Slide could be Impact of Oil Price Risk on Stocks.

SLIDE 3: This is good and proper sequencing, after giving background, introduce research problem. Format should be improved as follows:

Title of slide could be RESEARCH GAP:

  • There exists lots of literature on impact of Oil prices on stock returns (Cite sources)

  • No literature on this in Pakistan

  • Furthermore, most literature focuses on aggregate impact, while actual impact should vary by sector -- oil is more important to some firms and less to others

SO: We plan to study firm level impact of oil price change within Pakistan.

[Note, some documentation and literature references should be provided in support of these points.]

SLIDE 4: First point could be moved back,as shown. Then this sllide is about PROPOSED METHODOLOGY to study the issue -- that is, a firm level study of oil price effects in Karachi Stock exchange. NOW you need to mention relevant literature on this slide -- where did you get the idea for this, who has done similar studies in other countries, etc. ALSO, some of the sentences refer to MOTIVATION and IMPORTANCE of studying this. That could be highllighted and put here briefly, or given a separate slide.

AGAIN style is too much on lengthy paragraphs of text, rather than short bullet points focusing on main ideas.

SLIDE 5: This is fine, but there should be more references to relevant literature.

SLIDE 6: This is OK. Clarifies importance/significance of research. It should be mentioned that diversification will be with respect to OIL price fluctuations only - since this research only addresses this risk. ALSO, relevant literature needs to be mentioned.

SLIDE 7: Lit Review -- all of these references could be moved into earlier slides to document these points as you make them -- you have made these claims without providing supporting references in earlier slides already.

SLIDE 8: Methodology: This is GOOD. You clearly state a source you are following. HOWEVER, prior to this, you should discuss what Narayan & Sharma did, and also any other relevant alternatives to this methodology -- this should come in lit review and provide motivation and explanation for your choice of methodology.

SLIDE 9: This is a GARCH model and should be titled like this to show link to lilterature. You might explain that GARCH improves on ARCH by adding lagged squared error term, and that this has been found useful in empirical and applied work.

SLIDE 9: Definitions of variables should be on same slide as Model (that is slide 8).

SLIDE 11: HERE we are getting a hint of who else has studied models of this type and what they have done. THe article cited on this slide should be the FOCUS of the literature review, since they are study the same problem as you and using some methodology. WE should know whether all of these authors ussed same methodology or different ones. THE first bullet point is one which should have been covered in the LIT REVIEW -- that is you have examined the literature for what independent variables have been used, and you are constructing a model on this basis. The REMAINING THREE points are of a DIFFERENT kind. Here you are explaining what you can learn from the model. This is VERY GOOD, since very few students have done this. You should clearly identify it -- After estimating the model, what do we expect to learn? The signs of coefficients will inform us about such and such issues -- as discussed in this slide.

SLIDE 12: Good, correctly placed data description. YOU should try to match data to variables that you are using in the model, so that we can see that you have data for each variable that you plan to use.

OVERALL GOOD presentation. The structure is correct. The most serious deficiency is the Literature Review, which should focus on what others have done, and especially what methodologies have been used to study the problem, so as to justify your own approach. The second weakness is in terms of motivating the research and explaining its importance.