Investing and Financial Market Behaviour

Description of the assessment

Component 2: COURSEWORK

Summary of Assessment Method: 

CW2 (50% of the total overall module mark) – 40% speaker review and 60% essay.

If you fail one part of coursework 2, it will be averaged with the other part of coursework 2, whatever the grade. You will receive your grade, comments, summary feedback and rubric feedback on the criteria via Turnitin within 3 weeks of submission of each part.

Assessment Content

CW2 is worth 50% of the module mark and has 2 parts. Part 1 is worth 40% of CW2 and Part 2 is worth 60% of CW2.

CW2 Part 1 (40% of CW2 and 20% of the total overall module mark)

You must write a critical academic review blog of one of the external speakers in no more than 500 words maximum. You will receive your grade, comments, overall feedback and feedback on the criteria via Turnitin within 3 weeks of submission. You MUST NOT EXCEED 500 words. If you exceed 500 words, the maximum grade you will be awarded is 50%. You must provide a word count at the end. The 500 words includes citations but does not include a title, the word count statement or the reference list.

The aim is to show that you can create a critical academic review blog of an industry expert’s view, suitable for posting on an on-line academic blog. This is the kind of work you would do if you were working for a financial organisation. You must have attended the invited external speaker session on which you choose to write the summary blog. This will be in the module lecture time. We have the attendance records and we will check that you have attended. Your review blog should follow the marking rubric and guidelines below.  You must not exceed 500 words (excluding any references). You must provide a word count at the end of the review.

You must adopt an academic voice for the blog.  Within the blog, you must produce an overview of the speaker’s main ideas and arguments. This is not a summary of all the points made, but a critical review of the point of the ‘whole’ session, the speaker’s theoretical viewpoints and main arguments and conclusions. It must contain a critical discussion of ‘how’ the speaker approached the issue. This might include examining the method adopted (using theory and cases, using a historical analysis, examining recent evidence, comparison of countries, etc) and assessing how and why this approach was used. You also need to identify how the speaker’s issue links with theory in your module. This theory should include aspects of market failure and behavioural bias. The whole overview must be well constructed and any evidence you refer to must be sourced to the speaker presentation (PowerPoint slides) and any theory identified, referenced to a source such as a textbook or journal article. You will be marked using the rubric provided below.

You do not need many references. You should cite and refer to the speaker, the speaker’s materials and if you refer to a theoretical concept, then you should also provide a citation and reference for this.

CW2 Part 2 (60% of CW2 and 30% of the total overall module mark)

1. You must write a short focused essay which analyses and critically evaluates one of the two topics below.  (1,500 words maximum). You will receive your grade, comments, overall feedback and feedback on the criteria via Turnitin within 3 weeks of submission.

Essay topics:

1. Critically assess the extent to which market failure and behavioural bias theory can explain financial crises in general, referring to evidence from one recent financial crisis.
2. Critically assess the extent to which market failure and behavioural bias theory can be used to explain bank failures during the 2008 financial crisis, referring to evidence from one bank failure during the 2008 financial crisis.

You MUST NOT EXCEED the 1,500 word limit or you will lose marks as follows:

1. 10 marks deducted for exceeding the word limit by up to 250 words
   1. 20 marks deducted for exceeding the word limit by 251-500 words
   1. 30 marks deducted for exceeding the word limit by 501-750 words
   1. 50 marks deducted for exceeding the word limit by more than 750 words 

You must provide a word count at the end of the essay. The word limit includes citations, tables and charts, but does not include the reference list or the word count statement.

Suggested structure for your Essay.

1. Short introduction, say what your aim is, why and how you will achieve it within the essay.
2. A discussion of the main issue/focus/history or background to the organisation/sector/issue.  You will be presenting some background evidence here that will be drawn from a variety of sources many of which will be electronic and/or web pages. You must cite in the essay all your sources as you use them.  Avoid direct quotes, it is bad style. Take the ideas and evidence from your sources, write it up in your own words and cite the sources after each relevant sentence. Use the Harvard style. If you are unsure how to deal with websites, then go to the library and get their Harvard referencing style guide.
3. A discussion of the relevant concepts and theory that you are using to examine the issue, explaining why they are relevant to the issue. You must consider market efficiency, the economic market failure theory, regulation theory and the theory of behavioural bias. You need to look market failure issues such as lack of competition, externalities, moral hazard and adverse selection, for example, and behavioural factors and biases such as herding, confirmation bias, overconfidence, present bias, etc. You need to explain why the theory and/or concepts are relevant in the context of your essay focus.  You might be using them to examine causes and effects, evaluate outcomes, or judge responsibility for outcomes for example.  In this section you are more likely to have sources from text books, web sites and, specialist magazines such as the economist, etc. Information and ideas from these must all be cited and referenced using the Harvard style.
4. A section where you use detailed evidence from different sources about the issue together with the theory and concepts you have identified, to explore what happened.  This is analysis. The idea is to discuss, evaluate and comment.   Your comments are your views, and should be drawn and based directly from your theory discussion and evidence evaluation.  In this section you are more likely to have sources from academic journals, research papers from global institutions such as the Bank for International Settlements and the Bank of England, specialist magazines such as the economist, etc.
5. A short conclusion, no new material here.

CW2 Assessment Schedule

Submission Deadline for CW2 part 1: You may submit before this deadline.  The external speaker critical review blog must be written in Word and submitted via the Turnitin assessment link on Blackboard.

Submission Deadline for CW2 part 2: You may submit before this deadline.   Your essay must be submitted as a Word file via the Turnitin assessment link on Blackboard. You must provide a word count at the end of the essay. You will be penalised if you exceed the word limit of 1,500 words.

Summative Feedback – you will be provided with summative feedback in the form of in-text comments, final comments and marking rubric within 3 weeks of the final submission deadline.

Both parts of the CW2 assessment will be marked anonymously.

CW2 Assessment Criteria

In the evaluation of your meeting the module learning outcomes, the marking criteria we provide for CW2 will follow the University’s Undergraduate scale.

% mark	Mark descriptors	Class
70-100%	Excellent Outstanding; high to very high standard; a high level of critical analysis and evaluation, incisive original thinking; commendable originality; exceptionally well researched; high quality presentation; exceptional clarity of ideas; excellent coherence and logic. Trivial or very minor errors. For the highest marks (90 – 100%): an exceptional standard of work illustrating thorough and in-depth understanding, communicated with exceptional authority.	First
60-69%	Very good A very good standard; a very good level of critical analysis and evaluation; significant originality; well researched; a very good standard of presentation; commendable clarity of ideas; thoughtful and effective presentation; very good sense of coherence and logic; minor errors only.	Second Division 1
50-59%	Good A good standard; a fairly good level of critical analysis and evaluation; some evidence of original thinking or originality; quite well researched; a good standard of presentation; ideas generally clear and coherent, some evidence of misunderstandings; some deficiencies in presentation.	Second Division 2
40-49%	Satisfactory A sound standard of work; a fair level of critical analysis and evaluation; little evidence of original thinking or originality; adequately researched; a sound standard of presentation; ideas fairly clear and coherent, some significant misunderstandings and errors; some weakness in style or presentation but satisfactory overall.	Third
35-39%	Unsatisfactory Overall marginally unsatisfactory; some sound aspects but some of the following weaknesses are evident; inadequate critical analysis and evaluation; little evidence of originality; not well researched; standard of presentation unacceptable; ideas unclear and incoherent; some significant errors and misunderstandings. Marginal fail.	Marginal Fail
21-34%	Poor Below the pass standard; a poor critical analysis and evaluation; virtually no evidence of originality; poorly researched; presentation unacceptable and not up    to graduate standard; ideas confused and incoherent, some serious misunderstandings and errors. A clear fail, short of pass standard.	Fail
1-20%	Very poor Well below the pass standard, with many serious errors. Standard of presentation totally unacceptable, incoherent and may be severely  under- length. No evidence of evaluation or application. A very clear fail, well short of the pass standard.
NS	Non-submission No work has been submitted.
Z	Academic offence notation Applies to proven instances of academic offence.