Completed

Functioning of the Financial Market and Ethical Awareness – Funding for Research Projects

Important dates

19 May 2020

Date call is made active

25 May 2020

Application submission deadline

10 Nov 2020

Grant allocation meeting

01 Dec 2020

Earliest permitted project start

01 Jun 2021

Latest permitted project start

31 Dec 2025

Latest permitted project completion

Important dates

Purpose

The Finance Market Fund is designed to help to increase knowledge about how financial markets function and to promote greater understanding of relevant ethical issues.

Funding under the Finance Market Fund is to support research, education or public awareness initiatives related to the functioning and role of the financial market. Projects may address deficiencies in the system, ethics and good business practices in the relevant areas as well as consumer interests. Funding will not be granted for individuals to pursue ordinary occupational education activities.

This call for proposals is to provide support for research projects that focus on the functioning of financial markets and that will promote greater understanding of relevant ethical issues. Support from the Finance Market Fund is to be targeted towards spheres of activity relating to the securities market (see Section 7 of the rules set out for the Finance Market Fund (in Norwegian)). Support may also be targeted towards banking and insurance activity, other areas of the financial market and accounting and revision.

Applications must clearly demonstrate that the project is of relevance in relation to the purpose of the Finance Market Fund and that the funding will promote activity that would otherwise not have taken place. The grant application must also describe the potential ramifications if the funding amount awarded is smaller than what was originally sought.

Please see the rules set out for the Finance Market Fund at www.finansmarkedsfondet.no (in Norwegian only).

About the call for proposals

This call for proposals is intended to lead to ground-breaking research projects of high scientific quality at the forefront of international research.

The Norwegian-language call for proposals is the legally binding version.

Who is eligible to apply?

Who can participate in the project?

Requirements relating to the Project Owner

The organisation listed as the Project Owner in the application form must have approved the submission of the grant application.

Requirements relating to the project manager

To qualify as project manager, individuals must hold an approved doctorate or have obtained qualifications at associate professorship level (in Norwegian only) by the date of the application submission deadline. In this context, employment in the Norwegian research institute sector in a position as forsker 1 (research professor), forsker 2 (senior researcher) or seniorforsker (senior researcher) is considered equivalent qualification.

Requirements relating to partners

Only other research organisations may participate as partners in the Researcher Project and receive Research Council funding.

Other types of organisations, such as companies and other undertakings, are not eligible to receive support for Researcher Projects and may not be project partners, but they may serve as suppliers of R&D services to the project. In such cases, the intellectual property rights related to the result of the supplier’s work activities will become the property of the institution procuring the services.

What can you seek funding for?

Please see the webpage on “What to enter in the project budget” for details and important information.

The following costs may be covered by the Research Council:

  • Operating expenses, including procurement of R&D services and costs related to the operation and depreciation of scientific equipment. Please refer to the Research Council’s guidelines for depreciation of equipment.
  • For academic positions in the university and university college sector and all doctoral and post-doctoral research fellowships in Norway, the amount sought must follow these rates. You may apply for funding to cover the following positions:
    • Doctoral research fellowships for up to three years and post-doctoral research fellowships for up to three years. Hiring procedures, employment periods, work duties, education plans, etc., must comply with the regulations concerning terms and conditions of employment for the posts of post-doctoral research fellow, research fellow, research assistant and resident laid down by the Ministry of Education and Research.
    • Academic positions.

Researcher Projects under the Research Council are not open to the allocation of state aid. This means that companies and other undertakings may not be the recipients of project funding. These entities may, however, serve as suppliers of R&D services to the project.

For more information about the state aid rules, see here.

Calculating support

Funding may be sought to cover budgeted project costs. Payroll costs for project partners in Norway must be based on the lump-sum rates for fellowship-holders.

Conditions for support

Companies are not eligible to receive funding to cover projects costs.

Scientific articles and research data

The Project Owner (R&D organisation) is responsible for selecting the archiving solution(s) to use for storing research data generated during the project. The Project Owner must specify the planned solution(s) in connection with the revised grant proposal.

Reporting and disbursement of funding

Funding will be disbursed in arrears, and only actual expenses entered in the institution’s accounts will be covered. All reports are to be submitted online.

Section 11 item 10 of the rules set out for the Finance Market Fund (in Norwegian only) stipulates special requirements for publishing, among other things.

Relevant thematic areas for this call

Policy and government administration areas

Finance markets and economic governance

Practical information

Requirements for this application type

You may revise and resubmit your grant application form multiple times up to the application submission deadline. We recommend that you submit your application as soon as you have filled in the application form and uploaded all mandatory attachments. After the deadline, it is the most recently submitted version of the grant application that will be processed.

  • The grant application, including all attachments, may be submitted in Norwegian or English.
  • All attachments must be uploaded in PDF format.

Mandatory attachments

  • A project description of maximum 10 pages using the designated template which can be found below;
  • A CV for the project manager, using the designated template which can be found below;
  • CVs for key project participants, using the designated template which can be found below.

Grant applications that do not satisfy the above requirements will be rejected.

Optional attachments

  • A proposal for up to three referees who are presumed to be impartial and qualified to review the grant proposal.

Links to websites and documents, as well as other attachments than those specified above, will not be included in the application review process. There is no technical validation of the content of the attachments you upload, so please make sure that you upload the correct file for the selected type of attachment.

Assessment criteria

Grant applications will be assessed on the basis of the following criteria:

Excellence

The extent to which the proposed work is ambitious, novel, and goes beyond the state-of-the-art
• Scientific creativity and originality.
• Novelty and boldness of hypotheses or research questions.
• Potential for development of new knowledge beyond the current state-of-the-art, including significant theoretical, methodological, experimental or empirical advancement.

The quality of the proposed R&D activities
• Quality of the research questions, hypotheses and project objectives, and the extent to which they are clearly and adequately specified.
• Credibility and appropriateness of the theoretical approach, research design and use of scientific methods. Appropriate consideration of interdisciplinary approaches.
• The extent to which appropriate consideration has been given to ethical issues, safety issues, gender dimension in research content, and use of stakeholder/user knowledge if appropriate.

Impact

Potential impact of the proposed research
• Potential for academic impact:
The extent to which the planned outputs of the project address important present and/or future scientific challenges.
• Potential for societal impact (if addressed by the applicant):
The extent to which the planned outputs of the project address UN Sustainable Development Goals or other important present and/or future societal challenges.
• The extent to which the potential impacts are clearly formulated and plausible.

Communication and exploitation
• Quality and scope of communication and engagement activities with different target audiences, including relevant stakeholders/users.

Implementation

The quality of the project manager and project group
• The extent to which the project manager has relevant expertise and experience, and demonstrated ability to perform high-quality research (as appropriate to the career stage).
• The degree of complementarity of the participants and the extent to which the project group has the necessary expertise needed to undertake the research effectively.

The quality of the project organisation and management
• Effectiveness of the project organisation, including the extent to which resources assigned to work packages are aligned with project objectives and deliverables.
• Appropriateness of the allocation of tasks, ensuring that all participants have a valid role and adequate resources in the project to fulfil that role.
• Appropriateness of the proposed management structures and governance.

Overall assessment of the referee/panel

Overall assessment of the referee/panel based, on the criteria Excellence, Impact and Implementation.

Relevance to the call for proposals

The extent to which the project satisfies the guidelines and stipulations set out in the call for proposals.

It is particularly important that grant applications clearly demonstrate that the activity is of relevance in relation to the purpose of the Finance Market Fund and that the funding provided will promote activity that would not otherwise have taken place.

The grant application must also describe the potential ramifications if the funding amount awarded is smaller than what was originally sought. Please see the rules set out for the Finance Market Fund at www.finansmarkedsfondet.no (in Norwegian only).

The Board of Directors seeks to achieve a broad project portfolio with a wide range of scientific areas and institutions.

Administrative procedures

All grant applications for Researcher Projects will be assessed by international referee panels. Once the panel assessments are completed, the grant applications will be assessed for relevance to this call. The administration will then submit its recommendation to the Finance Market Fund’s Board of Directors. The board is responsible for the final decisions regarding grant allocations.

Final decisions on allocation of funding are planned to be announced in mid-November 2020.

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