Background and capability of researchers The Finnish data on stock ownership from Euroclear Finland Ltd provides a unique opportunity to investigate investors' actual behavior that cannot be replicated in any other market. This has initiated a substantial body of literature investigating Finnish equity investors (Nasdaq Helsinki). Our research group has obtained the most comprehensive version of this dataset and has spent over 20 years refining it with regular updates. Our database currently covers all investors' stock ownership in Nasdaq Helsinki listed shares for the period 1995-2024 inclusive. We have published research in leading Journals such as the Journal of Finance, JFQA, and Review of Finance, and our work has been presented at leading conferences such as the American Finance Association, Western Finance Association, and SFS Cavalcade. Several awards have also been won for our research, for example, from the Finnish securities markets promotion foundation and the University of Vaasa (best conference paper award). Research problem and methodology Our two key hypotheses are: H1 The closer to the eastern border, the more impact we will see in investors' portfolios from the increased geopolitical risk being particularly high for Finland in the period 2022-2025. H2 After Finland's NATO membership on April 4. 2023 will have a improving impact on equity return as geopolitcal risk decreases, H3 Cohorts of investors that re more likely to be drafted into the defense forces, male, 20-40 years old, we expect that these individual will lower their risk exposure in the market. The typical approach uses news-based measures of adverse geopolitical events and associated risks (e.g. Caldara and Iacoviello, 2022). We will use recent machine learning and artificial intelligence techniques to improve existing news-based risk measures, and will introduce equity porfolio returns at the portfolio level contrasting clear events of large shifts in geopolitical risk such as the Russian-Ukrainian war to the much calmer times in the 2010-2020 period in a difference-in-differences setting. My research assistants and PhD students at the University of Sydney are highly skilled in data analysis and econometric technique, ane we have ample data resources to carry out this research. Ultimately we wish to investigate how investors behave in the event of increased geopolitical tension, to see the full market wide impact on Finnish investor sentiment during periods of GEO political change. Particularly a new angle in this research is that we will also analyse other investor cohorts than households, and include institutional investor never before attempted at scale. One of the main benefits of the Euroclear data is that it covers the whole population (not a sample) of all investors that have held or hold ownership in Nasdaq Helsinki listed shares. This makes research using these data particularly fruitful, as it is rare that empirical researchers can work with the entire population, making inferences so much more powerful. Of course, theoretically, this population is only one instance of all the possible outcomes that could have come about since the start of the data in 1995 (including the ownership stakes that were then held). This means that traditional econometric methods still apply. Aimed outcomes as a result of this research We aim to publish two articles in leading finance journals ranked in the top 6 journal cohorts as an outcome of this research. Timetable The timetable for the research work is one year from 1 of June 2025 to 1 June 2026. Reporting We aim provide a highly detailed report of our research to the foundation that are more comprehensive and practical than the publishable research articles.

2025

2026