Stanford University and the academic publisher Elsevier have released their "World's Top 2% Scientists 2026" list.
Jun Pan, Professor of Finance and Chair Professor at SAIF, was named to the "Career-long Impact" list. Professor Pan and Feng Li, Chair Professor of Accounting, also both appear on the "Single Recent Year Impact" list for economics and business. This is Professor Pan's eighth time on the list and Professor Li's sixth.
Compiled by Professor John P. A. Ioannidis's team at Stanford using Scopus data, the list ranks scientists on a composite of indicators, including total citations, the h-index, and the hm-index, and reports career-long and single-year impact separately. Scientists are classified into 20 fields and 174 subfields so that each is assessed against peers in the same discipline.
Since its founding in 2009, SAIF has set out to build a world-class finance institution in China, distinguished by first-rate faculty, exceptional finance talent, an open research platform, and a leading think tank. Its faculty, among the strongest in finance in Asia and at the forefront in China, produce research that has made SAIF the preeminent authority on China's financial landscape and a leading Chinese voice on global financial issues—work that supports Shanghai's development as an international financial center and reinforces Shanghai Jiao Tong University's standing as a world-class university.
About Professor Jun Pan
Jun Pan is a Professor of Finance and SAIF Chair Professor at the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance (SAIF), Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Before joining SAIF, she was the School of Management Distinguished Professor of Finance at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Her research spans Chinese financial markets, fintech, asset pricing, financial derivatives markets, credit risk models, financial crises, market liquidity, market microstructure, risk management, and fixed-income markets. She has published more than 20 papers in leading international academic journals, including Econometrica, the Journal of Finance, the Review of Financial Studies, and the Journal of Financial Economics.
Professor Pan currently serves as Department Editor for Finance at Management Science and as an Associate Editor of the Journal of Finance. She previously served as Editor of the Review of Finance and as an Associate Editor of the Review of Financial Studies. She has been a Senior Research Fellow at the Asian Bureau of Finance and Economic Research (ABFER) since 2014 and joined its Executive Committee in June 2024. She has also served as a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER).
Professor Pan has received numerous academic honors, including the 2015 Stephen A. Ross Prize in Financial Economics, the 2021 Best Paper Award and the 2026 XiYue Best Paper Award at the China International Conference in Finance (CICF), and the WRDS Best Paper Award at the 2024 Asian Finance Association conference. She has also been named to Elsevier’s list of Highly Cited Chinese Researchers every year from 2021 to 2025.
Professor Pan earned her PhD in physics from New York University in 1995 and her PhD in finance from Stanford University in 2000.
About Professor Feng Li
Feng Li is a Chair Professor of Accounting at the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance (SAIF), Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Before joining SAIF, he was the Harry Jones Associate Professor of Accounting, with tenure, at the Stephen M. Ross School of Business, University of Michigan. At SAIF, he has held leadership roles, including Deputy Dean for Non-Executive Programs (2016–2018) and Director of the Finance MBA Program (2015–2018).
Professor Li's research focuses primarily on financial statement analysis, the application of deep learning in financial analysis, asset pricing, and risk management. He has published more than 20 articles in leading academic journals, including the Journal of Accounting Research, the Journal of Accounting and Economics, the Accounting Review, Management Science, and the Journal of Financial Economics.
His research has earned wide recognition. In 2018 he received the American Accounting Association's Distinguished Contributions to Accounting Literature Award, presented annually to recognize the uniqueness and magnitude of a publication's contribution to accounting education, practice, or research. He has also been named to Elsevier's list of Highly Cited Chinese Researchers every year from 2022 to 2025.
At SAIF, Professor Li teaches courses such as Principles of Accounting, Financial Reporting and Analysis, Essentials of Accounting for Decision Makers, and Financial Innovation. His teaching has been recognized with the SAIF Teaching Excellence Award in 2018 and 2022 and Shanghai Jiao Tong University's Excellent Educator Award in 2020.
