With an international academic background, Melissa Porras Prado studies how institutional investors influence firms, markets, and the broader economy. Her research examines how ownership structures, investor constraints, and market frictions shape behaviour and outcomes, with a particular focus on mutual funds, short selling, and the growing footprint of institutional capital across industries and regions.
A distinctive feature of her work is the use of novel, science-based data to measure the real-world consequences of financial activity. By integrating satellite-based environmental indicators, facility-level datasets, and other alternative metrics into financial research, she develops new ways to understand how institutional ownership connects to sustainability transitions, geographic investment patterns, and industrial change.
At Nova SBE, Melissa holds the Novo Banco Chair in ESG. She is also a Research Affiliate at the CEPR – Centre for Economic Policy Research – and an active contributor to international research networks examining the links between finance and the real economy.
Her research has been published in leading academic journals, including the Journal of Finance, Journal of Financial Economics, and the Review of Financial Studies, and presented at major conferences such as the Western Finance Association (WFA), the American Finance Association (AFA), and the European Finance Association (EFA).
Melissa Porras Prado’s research highlights how institutional capital shapes economic systems beyond financial markets. By combining finance with science-based measurement tools, her work offers new evidence on how ownership patterns and investor constraints influence sustainability transitions, resource allocation, and real outcomes.