Student teams used PPP data to show community bank role in pandemic

Washington, DC - A team of students from William & Mary has won the CSBS 2022 Data Analytics Competition, CSBS announced today. This year’s competition challenged students to develop a data analytics model that demonstrates the role community banks played during the pandemic using data from the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). 

“We have all been extremely impressed with the creativity and rigorous technical skills from all the students,” said Tom Siems, CSBS chief economist and creator of the competition. "Engaging with the academic community effectively combines both research on banking with analytical and data science techniques, helping us be part of building the workforce of tomorrow. We hope all participants are inspired to continue their academic studies in economics, finance, data science, accounting, or other fields that offer a valuable perspective on community banking and financial sector supervision."

The winning team members are Gio DeFrank, Junghee Mun and Kristina Posner and led by faculty advisor Dr. Joseph Wilck. The William & Mary team found that partnerships between fintech firms and community banks did not play a significant role in boosting minority or low and moderate-income (LMI) outreach via PPP loan distribution in 2020. The team recommends further research in this area as they believe fintech partnerships could help better diversify the banking ecosystem and improve programs like the PPP. The William & Mary team will receive $5,000 as first place winners. 

A team from the University of California at Irvine placed second. The five-member team included Abhishek Karimpuzha Devarajan, Qi Wang, Qingqing Yu, Wanjing Xu and Yixuan Cai and will collect $2,500. The team was led by led by faculty advisor Dr. Gary Richardson.  

A team from Carnegie Mellon University placed third. Students Thomas Yu Chow Tam, Shun Tomita and Jamie (Jeong Yeon) Lim were led by Dr. Gabriela Gongora-Svartzman and will receive $1,500. 

A Southern Methodist University team placed fourth. Team members Melissa Serrano, Annalise Sumpon, and Madi Tedrow were led by faculty advisor Dr. Eli Olinick and will receive $1,000.  

To view more details of the 2022 Data Analytics Competition, including the papers and final presentations, click here.  

Media Contact:  Susanna Barnett, 202-407-7156, [email protected] 

Twitter: @CSBSNews

The Conference of State Bank Supervisors (CSBS) is the national organization of bank regulators from all 50 states, American Samoa, District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands. State regulators supervise roughly three-quarters of all U.S. banks and a variety of non-depository financial services. CSBS, on behalf of state regulators, also operates the Nationwide Multistate Licensing System to license and register non-depository financial service providers in the mortgage, money services businesses, consumer finance and debt industries.