Dr Jonathan James has been presented with the award for the 2008/09 academic year for research in the field of macroeconomics, to be carried out in partnership with Professor Phillip Lawler, from the School of Business and Economics. 

The research will investigate the extent to which a state authority should disclose to the public its own opinion regarding a bank's solvency position.

The nature and quality of publicly available information regarding a bank's finances may influence an individual's decision whether or not to withdraw money, and depends not only on a person's opinion of how solvent the bank is, but also on their judgement of the likelihood of other depositors withdrawing their money from the bank.

The junior fellowship is one of four that have been awarded by the Royal Economic Society for the new academic year. 

The fellowship will help finance research to be undertaken jointly with Professor Phillip Lawler and will focus on abstract economies in which private-sector agents differ in their opinions regarding an economic fundamental (for example, the 'true' value of the currency's exchange rate, or the strength of economy-wide demand in the near future).

Professor Lawler and Dr James anticipate that the research will also shed light on:

(i) how tough a stance against inflation a central bank should adopt when members of the public differ in their views regarding the current or imminent state of the economy, as well as the central bank's optimal disclosure policy in such a scenario.

(ii) the appropriate amount of public investment in a technology when the gain to each private firm from investing in it is larger, the more widespread is its adoption across the economy.

Professor Philip Murphy, Deputy Head of the School of Business and Economics said: "Royal Economic Society Junior Fellowships are highly regarded awards in Economics and they are only awarded to the most promising young researchers in the UK.  

"Competition for these awards is fierce and the fact that Dr James was successful in obtaining RES Fellowship is a testimony to the quality of the research he is undertaking with colleagues in Swansea on bank runs and liquidity crises.

"Given the events witnessed in global financial markets in the last few months it is a particularly topical issue and this research places Swansea at the forefront of the work being done in this area world-wide."