Dr Christos Mavrovitis (Mavis)
About
Biography
Christos is a Senior Lecturer of Finance at the Surrey Business School. He graduated from the University of Athens with a BSc degree in Economics and obtained an MSc degree from Durham Business School in the field of Corporate Finance. He completed his PhD in Mergers and Acquisitions (M&As) at the Henley Business School (ICMA Centre), University of Reading.
His research focuses on mergers and acquisitions, CEO turnovers, CEO overconfidence, asset sales, and CEO acquisitiveness, with particular emphasis on their implications for shareholder value creation. His work is regularly presented at leading conferences in North America and Europe and has been published in journals such as the Journal of Corporate Finance, Financial Management, European Financial Management, European Journal of Finance, Long Range Planning, and the Journal of Financial Research. He also contributes to teaching across undergraduate, postgraduate, and doctoral programmes in finance.
Christos plays a leadership role in supporting colleagues' professional development, having co-led the design and implementation of Surrey Business School's mentoring framework for academic promotion, with a particular focus on mid-career colleagues. He also serves as Programme Director of the MSc in International Corporate Finance and is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. In addition, he is a Certified Management and Business Educator (CMBE), awarded by the Chartered Association of Business Schools, and a UK Statistics Authority Accredited Researcher, enabling him to access and analyse de-identified secure data in trusted research environments.
Areas of specialism
University roles and responsibilities
- Programme Director of MSc in International Corporate Finance, 2016 - Present
- Staff Mid-career Development Lead, 2024 - Present
- Internal Examiner of PhD Theses, 2013 - Present
- Supervisor of MSc students, 2012 - Present
- Personal Placement Tutor, 2012 - Present
- Personal Academic Tutor, 2012 - Present
Previous roles
Affiliations and memberships
News
In the media
ResearchResearch interests
Mergers and Acquisitions; Merger Waves; CEO Turnovers; CEO Overconfidence; Corporate Governance; Asset Sales
Indicators of esteem
Referee for the Journal of Corporate Finance
Referee for Long Range Planning
Refereee for Journal of Management Studies
Referee for the British Accounting Review
Referee for European Financial Management
Referee for Corporate Governance: An International Review
Referee for European Journal of Finance
Referee for International Journal of the Economics of Business
Referee for International Journal of Banking, Accounting and Finance
Referee for International Review of Financial Analysis
Referee for Economic Modelling
Referee of Australian Journal of Management
Referee of R&D Management
Australian Journal of Management
Invited Presentations
- University of Southampton, Southampton, 2024
- Queen's Management School, Belfast, Northern Ireland, 2023
- Rotterdam School of Management (RSM), Erasmus University, Netherlands, 2022
- Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA), Gujarat, India, 2022
- Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA), Gujarat, India, 2020
- Management School, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK, 2019
- Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA), Gujarat, India, 2019
- School of Business, Management, and Economics, University of Sussex, Sussex, UK, 2017
- ICMA Centre, University of Reading, Reading, UK, 2017
- Strathclyde Business School, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK, 2016
- Adam Smith Business School, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK, 2014
External Examiner
- University of Oxford, Said Business School, UK - Executive MBA, 2023 to date
- Edinburgh Napier University, UK - Validation of accounting and finance UG and PG programmes, 2022
- University of Hertfordshire, Hertfordshire, UK - BA (Hons) Finance, Accounting, 2015 - 2021
Research interests
Mergers and Acquisitions; Merger Waves; CEO Turnovers; CEO Overconfidence; Corporate Governance; Asset Sales
Indicators of esteem
Referee for the Journal of Corporate Finance
Referee for Long Range Planning
Refereee for Journal of Management Studies
Referee for the British Accounting Review
Referee for European Financial Management
Referee for Corporate Governance: An International Review
Referee for European Journal of Finance
Referee for International Journal of the Economics of Business
Referee for International Journal of Banking, Accounting and Finance
Referee for International Review of Financial Analysis
Referee for Economic Modelling
Referee of Australian Journal of Management
Referee of R&D Management
Australian Journal of Management
Invited Presentations
- University of Southampton, Southampton, 2024
- Queen's Management School, Belfast, Northern Ireland, 2023
- Rotterdam School of Management (RSM), Erasmus University, Netherlands, 2022
- Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA), Gujarat, India, 2022
- Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA), Gujarat, India, 2020
- Management School, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK, 2019
- Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA), Gujarat, India, 2019
- School of Business, Management, and Economics, University of Sussex, Sussex, UK, 2017
- ICMA Centre, University of Reading, Reading, UK, 2017
- Strathclyde Business School, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK, 2016
- Adam Smith Business School, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK, 2014
External Examiner
- University of Oxford, Said Business School, UK - Executive MBA, 2023 to date
- Edinburgh Napier University, UK - Validation of accounting and finance UG and PG programmes, 2022
- University of Hertfordshire, Hertfordshire, UK - BA (Hons) Finance, Accounting, 2015 - 2021
Supervision
Postgraduate research supervision
PhD Students
Current
- Jiabao Wu: Coventry University (2025 – ongoing)
- Khaled Al Tarawneh: Coventry University (2024 - ongoing)
- Xinchao Song: University of Surrey (2023 - ongoing)
- Zeynep Ancel: University of Reading (2023 - ongoing)
Completed
- Tung Duy Nguyen: University of Surrey (completed - 2021)
- Soheila Malekpour: University of Surrey (completed - 2019)
- Tianjiao Yuan: University of Reading (completed - 2017)
- Nathan McNamee: University of Surrey (completed - 2016)
- PGR Summer School Tutor, 2013 - 2015
Teaching
Current modules
- Corporate Finance (MSc)
- International Corporate Finance Project (MSc)
- Finance (PhD, contributor)
- Topics in Finance (BSc)
Previous modules
- Portfolio Management (MSc)
- Corporate Finance (BSc)
- Microeconomics (BSc)
Teaching Awards
- 2013-14 Annual Award for Teaching Excellence in Finance and Accounting
- 2012-13 Top 20 Teachers in the Faculty of Business, Economics, and Law
- 2012-13 Annual Award for Teaching Excellence in Finance and Accounting
Students' Evaluation 2023-24 - Overall Satisfaction
95% in Corporate Finance
100% in Topics in Finance
Publications
Highlights
To view the full list of my publications and working papers please click the links below:
Most recent publication
Selling to buy: Asset sales, acquisition financing, and value creation
Journal of Financial Research 2025, forthcoming
In line with increased liquidity offered by asset sales, our findings show that firms selling large assets prior to acquisitions are more likely to use cash as payment method. Additionally, we find that in subsequent cash acquisitions, firms using cash stemming from asset sales experience higher announcement abnormal returns compared to firms using cash from other sources of funds, such as internally generated cash flows, debt financing, and equity issuance, which are linked to agency costs and information asymmetry effects. The higher wealth effects suggest that funds from asset sales are inflicted with relatively lower adverse valuation effects that are associated with other sources of funds.