What to Do in Financial Markets? Preferences and Incoherences of Future Investors

Abstract

The beliefs and strategies to be mobilized by individuals who are about to start their activity as investors in financial markets have been an issue scarcely explored in the field of sociology of finance. In this paper we present new evidence about the opinions of future investors recurring to a survey administered to 177 Master students of financial markets. Our results highlight the structural incoherence in the values adopted by future investors and the centrality of these social actors’ beliefs in the constitution of the prevailing practices in financial markets.