Aliaa Bassiouny to Deliver Lecture in Honor of Her Appointment to the A. Stevens Miles Professorship in Banking and Finance Bassiouny’s talk, titled “There Is a Story Behind This Number: What Financial Market Frictions Teach Us About the World,” will be held Oct. 21 in Northen Auditorium.

By Brian Laubscher
October 12, 2026

Aliaa Bassiouny, the A. Stevens Miles Professor of Banking and Finance at Washington and Lee University, will deliver a public lecture celebrating her appointment to the endowed professorship.

Bassiouny’s lecture, “There Is a Story Behind This Number: What Financial Market Frictions Teach Us About the World,” will be held at 5 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 21, in Northen Auditorium in Leyburn Library. The talk is free and open to the public. A reception will follow in the common area outside the auditorium.

The talk will draw on Bassiouny’s research on international financial markets and institutions, applying a liberal arts lens to explore what financial market frictions can reveal about the world beyond markets and money. Examining topics ranging from arbitrage and price discovery to currency crises and institutional voids, Bassiouny’s work demonstrates that financial outcomes are shaped not only by models but also by the interplay of history, law, politics, firms and people.

“Finance is often described as both a science and an art. As technology facilitates analyzing vast financial datasets, building models and generating answers, it matters now more than ever to lean into the liberal arts to refine our understanding of the world and the implications of our decisions,” Bassiouny said. “Drawing on my own research, I will share examples of how financial puzzles opened questions that could only be answered by looking beyond the numbers and models to interdisciplinary connections.”

Bassiouny joined the W&L faculty in 2019 after seven years as a professor of finance at the American University in Cairo (Egypt), where she chaired the Department of Management. At W&L, she serves as the faculty adviser for the Williams Investment Society, one of the largest student-managed investment funds in the U.S. Her research, which focuses on trading and investments in international financial markets, has appeared in peer-reviewed international finance journals including the Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money; International Review of Financial Analysis; Global Finance Journal; Applied Economics Letters; and Emerging Markets Finance and Trade.

Bassiouny is a non-executive board member for Orascom Development Egypt (ODE), serving as chair of the Audit and Risk Management Committee. She is also a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Multinational Financial Management. She earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration and an MBA in finance from the American University in Cairo. She also holds a Master of Research and Ph.D. in management sciences (finance) from ESADE Business School in Spain.

The A. Stevens Miles Professorship in Banking and Finance, established in 2016, supports a distinguished professor at Washington and Lee University who is an accomplished scholar and exceptional teacher with expertise in banking and finance.