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Welcome!
I am a Ph.D. Candidate in Finance at the London School of Economics and Political Science. I am on the 2025-2026 job market. My research interests are Corporate Finance, Data Economy, FinTech, and Banking.
Email: x.ma25[at]lse.ac.uk
Working Papers
Open Banking and Fintech Innovation Adoption: Evidence from Mobile Apps (Job Market Paper)
Abstract: This paper examines the impact of open banking adoption on competition and innovation in digital financial services. I construct a novel dataset by decompiling historical Android app source code to identify open banking API integrations among finance apps in the UK and EU. Linking this with monthly app performance data, I find that adoption significantly increases downloads, user activity, and revenue. Exploiting cross-country variation in authorization status within the same app, I provide causal evidence that access to consumer banking data drives these gains. Benefits are amplified during periods of heightened demand: apps with open banking performed better during the COVID-19 shock, particularly in lending, investment, and among startup fintechs. On the supply side, incumbent banks most exposed to open banking—especially in lending—face the strongest pressure, but respond by raising fee intensity and asset yields. Thus, banks are not only hurt but also adapt strategically. Overall, open banking fosters innovation while reshaping competition in the mobile finance ecosystem.
- Presented at: AFA 2026 PhD Student Poster (scheduled), Trans-Atlantic Doctoral Conference 2025, HEC Paris Finance PhD Workshop 2025, LSE PhD Workshop
The Supply and Demand for Data Privacy: Evidence from Mobile Apps
with Huan Tang and Bo Bian
Reject & Resubmit at Journal of Political Economy
Abstract: This paper investigates how consumers and investors react to the standardized disclosure of data privacy practices. Since December 2020, Apple has required all apps to disclose their data collection practices by filling out privacy ‘‘nutrition’’ labels that are standardized and easy to read. We web-scrape these privacy labels and first document several stylized facts regarding the supply of privacy. Second, augmenting privacy labels with weekly app downloads and revenues, we examine how this disclosure affects consumer behavior. Exploiting the staggered release of privacy labels and using the nonexposed Android version of each app to construct the control group, we find that after privacy label release, an average iOS app experiences a 14% (15%) drop in weekly downloads (revenue) when compared to its Android counterpart. The effect is stronger for more privacy-invasive and substitutable apps. Moreover, we observe negative stock market reactions, especially among firms that harvest more data, corroborating the adverse impact on product markets. Our findings highlight data as a key asset for firms in the digital era.
Award: Best Paper Award at the Annual Conference in Digital Economics 2022
Presented at: SITE 2024, FIRS 2024, EFA 2023, SFS Cavalcade 2023, AEA 2023, Colorado Finance Summit 2022, CEPR Household Finance Seminar, TSE-Yale Regulating the Digital Economy Workshop
Work in Progress
Data-driven Partnership among Firms: Evidence from GDPR
GDPR incentivizes data-driven partnerships that create value for firms. However, the increase is muted in Europe, leaving the region at a disadvantage in this emerging area of competition.
The Effect of Apple Transparency Tracking: An Analysis on App Monetization
Tracking apps face significant declines in downloads and revenue after Apple’s App Tracking Transparency. In response, they adjust ad strategies, adopt alternative SDKs, and raise in-app prices.
Teaching
LSE Class Teacher
- FM310 Corporate Finance, Investments and Financial Markets I, 2024 - 2025
- FM300 Corporate Finance, Investments and Financial Markets, 2023 - 2024
- FM212 Principle of Finance, 2021 - 2023
- FM250 Finance (Summer School), 2023
- FM255 Financial Markets and Portfolio Management (Summer School), 2021
LSE Teaching Assistant
- EE951 Corporate Finance and Strategy (Executive Program), 2023 - 2025
I was awarded the LSE Class Teacher Award in 2022, 2023, and 2024, and was nominated for the LSE Student Union Outstanding Teacher in 2023.