Finance · University of Texas at Austin

Zirui Wang

Ph.D. Candidate in Finance

Welcome to my website! I am a Finance Ph.D. student at the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas at Austin. My research interests include financial intermediation, household finance, financial regulation, forensic finance, FinTech, and real estate. My research has received grant support from the Real Estate Research Institute and the Brookings Institution, and has been or will be presented at conferences organized by the AEA, AFA, NBER, Harvard, MIT, Wharton, and Stanford. I will be on the 2026-27 academic job market.

Before coming to UT Austin, I earned a B.S. in Computer Science and a B.A. in Economics from the University of California, San Diego.

Curriculum Vitae Google Scholar

Research

Are Crypto Anti-Money Laundering Policies Effective?

with John M. Griffin and Kevin Mei

We find that crypto AML policies targeting services, such as mixers and exchanges, are more effective than those targeting users: Tornado Cash sanctions resulted in an 80% decline in illicit inflows, while sanctions on individuals often come late and criminals keep using related, non-sanctioned wallets.

SSRN Tornado Cash Network

We evaluate two major types of crypto enforcement actions: policies targeting services and policies targeting users. First, sanctions against the Tornado Cash mixer resulted in an 80.4% decline in hacker illicit inflows and shifted their usage toward more traceable swaps and bridges. Second, overseas exchange acceptance of illicit funds declines only after the U.S. DOJ settlements. Third, OFAC sanctions against individuals are relatively rare and often after the funds have left the wallets. Fourth, after Tether freezes, criminals continue to use related wallets. Overall, anti-money laundering policies targeting services like mixers and exchanges appear more effective than policies targeting users.

Presentations: AEA (scheduled); Asian Blockchain & Crypto Conference; FIRS; NBER Economic Analysis of Regulation; MFA; CEAR-CenFIS Conference; JOIM Conference; NFA; SITE Financial Regulation; OSU, Seminar

Tornado Cash transaction networks — Tornado Cash Transaction Networks

Tornado Cash outflows to destinations by hops — Tornado Cash Outflows to Destinations by Hops

OFAC sanctions and Tornado Cash activity — OFAC Sanctions

Tornado Cash outflows around the Binance settlement — Tornado Cash Outflows around Binance Settlement

Deposit bunching around the ten-thousand-dollar threshold — Deposit Bunching around the $10,000 Threshold

Bybit hack and flows to bridge — Bybit Hack and Flows to Bridge

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Who Bears Rising Commercial Property Insurance Costs?

with Minjoo Kim and Prateek Mahajan

Commercial property insurance costs have grown more than 15% annually since 2019; the burden is increasingly shifting from tenants to owners, and high-risk properties are reallocating toward larger owners with pricing advantages.

SSRN Brookings Working Paper

Using novel property-level operating statements for multifamily properties, we document a large, widespread rise in insurance costs and study who bears them along three margins. Across locations, costs rise most where disaster risk, reinsurance exposure, and homeowners-insurance regulatory frictions are greatest. Between tenants and owners, rent increases initially passed nearly all the cost to tenants, but this response has weakened sharply, leaving owners to absorb larger, recent shocks through lower profitability and transaction prices. Across owners, larger and lower-portfolio-risk owners obtain favorable insurance pricing, and high-risk assets reallocate toward these owners. Repricing therefore shapes cash flows, asset values, and ownership.

Presentations: AEA (scheduled); Chicago Fed (scheduled); ARIA; Harvard Climate and Insurance Gathering; USC Marshall Ph.D. Conference; FIRS; Brookings Institution; Georgia Tech-Atlanta Fed Household Finance, Young Scholar Poster; AFA, PhD Poster; AREUEA-ASSA Conference; SFA; Boca Finance and Real Estate Conference; FMA; UT Dallas Fall Finance Conference, PhD Poster; MRS; Deakin; UT San Antonio, Seminar; Baruch-JFQA Climate Finance Conference, PhD Poster (won Best Poster Award)

Time-series changes in insurance costs — Time-Series Changes in Insurance Costs

Cross-sectional differences in insurance cost changes — Cross-Sectional Differences in Insurance Cost Changes

Commercial versus homeowner insurance costs — Commercial Versus Homeowner Insurance Costs

Reinsurance and the rise in insurance costs — Reinsurance and the Rise in Insurance Costs

Effect of insurance cost increases on rents and profits — Effect of Insurance Cost Increase on Rents and Profits

Role of property owner size — Role of Property Owner Size

Role of average portfolio risk across owner size — Role of Average Risk of Owner Portfolio Across Owner Size

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Teaching

Instructor

Investment Management Undergraduate, Syllabus UT Austin: Summer 2024

Teaching Assistant

PhD courses

Corporate Finance TheoryUT Austin: Fall 2025
Empirical Methods in Asset PricingUT Austin: Fall 2024

Master's courses

Advanced Corporate Finance (MBA)UT Austin: Spring 2024, Fall 2024, Spring 2025, Fall 2025, Spring 2026
Advanced Corporate Finance and Investment Theory (MSBA)UT Austin: Fall 2024

Undergraduate courses

Investment ManagementUT Austin: Spring 2022, Spring 2023, Fall 2023, Fall 2024, Fall 2026
MicroeconomicsUC San Diego: Fall 2020, Winter 2021
Post-Relational Data ModelsUC San Diego: Fall 2020

Select student comments

“Zirui did great throughout the semester, definitely one of my top 5 TAs during my college career.”

“Zirui was definitely the most organized/helpful amongst all of the TAs.”

“He was always available for questions and responded to my emails promptly.”

“I just wanted to say thank you SO much for the extra time and help you poured into me these past few weeks. It really help me understand the material and prepare as best I could for the final. I appreciate your patience, your composure, and your understanding!”

“I appreciate all your efforts and hard work in helping us students learn more while preparing for exams. Your office hours for Exams 2 and 3 were a catalyst in understanding my mistakes and learning from them for the Final. I hope you can continue to be a TA and continue helping to foster learning in finance for students.”

“I really appreciate Zirui working to put together the exam reviews, even if it was difficult to wrangle the students together. Those really helped especially when he walked through the problems step by step and tried to go deeper by connecting conceptual questions to calculations.”

“Zirui and I debated some of my free-response answers on the first two exams. Although we sometimes had differing opinions, he was always receptive to what I was saying and looked to explain his perspective in the best way possible.”

“Really appreciated his help over email and office hours, even though he was super busy behind the scenes organizing the course. Also really enjoyed his presentation of his own research!”

Reading Groups

Forensic Finance

Wednesdays at 1:00 PM (2024)
Moontower Cafe in Rowling Hall

We held one paper presentation each week through the end of the semester. Professors John M. Griffin and Sam Kruger also joined us.

Weekly Schedule

Real Estate Finance

Thursdays at 3:30 PM (2024)
GSB 3.106

We held one paper presentation each week through the end of the semester. Professors Sheridan Titman, Laura Starks, Jonathan Cohn, and Caitlin Gorback also joined us.

Weekly Schedule