Helps students develop critical skills.
Professor Michael Aitken serves as Emeritus Professor in the Department of Applied Finance at Macquarie University, within the Business & Economics faculty. He earned his PhD from the University of New South Wales in 1991, Master of Business Studies in 1980, and Bachelor of Business Studies with First Class Honours in 1978, both from Massey University, New Zealand. Throughout his career, Aitken has held prominent academic appointments, including Chair of Finance at Macquarie University, Professor of ICT Strategy at the Macquarie Graduate School of Management, Chair of Capital Market Technology at the University of New South Wales from 2001 to 2014, and Professor of Finance at the University of Sydney from 1995 to 2001. As a pioneering entrepreneur, he founded the Securities Industry Research Centre of Asia-Pacific (SIRCA) in 1997 and the Capital Markets Cooperative Research Centre (CMCRC) in 2001, leading both as CEO during key periods. He has supervised over 130 PhD students and fostered collaborations that resulted in 122 publications in top finance journals.
Aitken's research interests center on security market microstructure, insider trading, market manipulation, liquidity, algorithmic trading, high-frequency trading, and market quality and fairness. Notable publications include "How should liquidity be measured?" (2003, cited 327 times), "Short sales are almost instantaneously bad news: Evidence from the Australian Stock Exchange" (1998, cited 532 times), "Price clustering on the Australian stock exchange" (1996), "Algorithmic trading and market quality: International evidence" (2023), and "Trade size, high-frequency trading, and colocation around the world" (2017). His innovations have transformed global financial markets: he developed the Thomson Reuters Tick History Service, capturing millions of trades per second for analysis, and the SMARTS Market Surveillance Service, sold to NASDAQ OMX in 2010, now monitoring major exchanges worldwide. These tools promote market efficiency, detect fraud, and inform regulatory decisions. Aitken's contributions earned him the 2016 Prime Minister's Prize for Innovation ($250,000), Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in 2014 for service to education, business, and finance, Ernst & Young National ICT Entrepreneur of the Year (2010), and the Business and Higher Education Round Table Award (1999).