Phebian Bewaji (FMBA 2015) received the Best Thesis Award on February 18 at the commencement ceremony. We would like to introduce her research paper in this section.

The paper investigates both domestic and US monetary policy impacts on the Nigerian equity market before and after the global financial crisis. Using the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach to cointegration, the study confirms the presence of a cointegrating relationship among the equity index, domestic treasury bill rate, broad money supply, exchange rate, and the US federal funds rate. Specifically, this study finds empirical evidence suggesting that a broad money supply has a positive and consistent impact on the stock market in all sample periods as compared with the domestic short-term policy rate. The positive impact of the money supply is much stronger during the crisis/post-crisis periods. In addition, the Nigerian equity market is more sensitive to changes in the exchange rate and the US monetary policy, measured by the US federal funds rate, which suggests a high reliance on external financing. These findings have implications for monetary policy implementation as well as stock market development initiatives.

After returning to the Central Bank of Nigeria, she was moved to the Financial Markets Department and she is currently in charge of the Market Development Section. She commented about her job: “Things are a bit more relaxed now. Occasionally, I find myself peeking into my KAIST notes and textbooks (particularly those on Options, Futures and Derivatives; Financial Accounting, Foreign Exchange Markets, International Finance, M&A and Chinese Financial Markets). I am grateful for the experiences and training in KAIST, and also for the Korean "fighting" spirit. It has been really useful in getting me on track as fast as possible.”

○ Subject: Financial Crisis, Monetary Policy and Stock Market Performance in Nigeria
 - An ARDL Approach
○ Written by: Phebian Nwakaego Bewaji (FMBA 2015, Central Bank of Nigeria)
○ Advisor: Jangkoo Kang