Ali Jafarzadeh

PhD Candidate in Finance
Leeds School of Business · University of Colorado Boulder
Research Interests Corporate Finance · Innovation · Industrial Organization
Ali Jafarzadeh, Finance PhD Candidate at the University of Colorado Boulder

Research

Working Paper
Second-Year Paper

Technological similarity helps determine a target's value to an acquirer, but this relationship changes as firms innovate. Using semantic embeddings of patent portfolios, I show that both current technological distance and the history of technological convergence help explain acquisition choices among otherwise similar targets.

Scheduled for presentation: FMA 2026 · SFA 2026
Work in Progress
The Evolution of Accounting Disclosure
with Diego Garcia

Using Moody's Industrial Manuals from 1920--1969, we study which accounting entries firms disclosed, how disclosure differed across firms, and how reporting practices changed over time.

Access to Finance and Local Economic Growth after World War II

Using historical Moody's Government Manuals, this project studies how differences in local access to finance shaped economic growth in the postwar United States.

About Me

Outside academia, I enjoy playing volleyball, hiking and exploring the outdoors, and being with family and friends. I’m curious about the forces that shape both individual lives and societies, from values, character, ambition, and hardship to institutions, opportunity, social failure, recovery, and development. I especially enjoy conversations that let me hear how other people understand these issues.