Experimenting with financial professionals

As key players in financial markets and the broader industry, financial professionals are increasingly used as experimental research participants. We review over 50 studies comparing financial professionals to laypeople and conduct meta-analyses of 22 eligible studies spanning from 1986 to 2023. Our findings reveal persistent and robust support for financial professionals being more risk-loving, but little evidence of superior forecasting accuracy. Further analyses indicate that larger monetary payments result in greater behavioral differences between financial professionals and laypeople, suggesting an increased susceptibility to incentives among professionals. This systematic review not only synthesizes experimental results, contributing to recent discussions about external validity and generalizability, but also highlights critical methodological considerations when experimenting with financial professionals.