How to format your references using the Journal of Finance citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Journal of Finance. For a complete guide how to prepare your manuscript refer to the journal's instructions to authors.

Using reference management software

Typically you don't format your citations and bibliography by hand. The easiest way is to use a reference manager:

Paperpile	The citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNote	Download the output style file
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and others	The style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeX	BibTeX syles are usually part of a LaTeX template. Check the instructions to authors if the publisher offers a LaTeX template for this journal.

Journal articles

Those examples are references to articles in scholarly journals and how they are supposed to appear in your bibliography.

Not all journals organize their published articles in volumes and issues, so these fields are optional. Some electronic journals do not provide a page range, but instead list an article identifier. In a case like this it's safe to use the article identifier instead of the page range.

A journal article with 1 author

Brody, Herb, 2014, Schizophrenia, Nature 508, S1.

A journal article with 2 authors

Takeuchi, Jun K., and Benoit G. Bruneau, 2009, Directed transdifferentiation of mouse mesoderm to heart tissue by defined factors, Nature 459, 708–711.

A journal article with 3 authors

Stine, A. R., P. Huybers, and I. Y. Fung, 2009, Changes in the phase of the annual cycle of surface temperature, Nature 457, 435–440.

A journal article with 4 or more authors

Vander Weele, Caitlin M., Cody A. Siciliano, Gillian A. Matthews, Praneeth Namburi, Ehsan M. Izadmehr, Isabella C. Espinel, Edward H. Nieh, Evelien H. S. Schut, Nancy Padilla-Coreano, Anthony Burgos-Robles, Chia-Jung Chang, Eyal Y. Kimchi, Anna Beyeler, Romy Wichmann, Craig P. Wildes, and Kay M. Tye, 2018, Dopamine enhances signal-to-noise ratio in cortical-brainstem encoding of aversive stimuli, Nature 563, 397–401.

Books and book chapters

Here are examples of references for authored and edited books as well as book chapters.

An authored book

Wilson, Gregory P., 2011, Managing to the New Regulatory Reality (John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, NJ).

An edited book

Nowak, Raphaël, and Andrew Whelan, eds., 2016, Networked Music Cultures: Contemporary Approaches, Emerging Issues. Pop Music, Culture and Identity (Palgrave Macmillan UK, London).

A chapter in an edited book

Kagaya, Tetsuyuki, 2014, Matching Expenses with Revenues Around the World, in Kunio Ito and in Makoto Nakano ed.: International Perspectives on Accounting and Corporate Behavior. Advances in Japanese Business and Economics (Springer Japan, Tokyo).

Web sites

Sometimes references to web sites should appear directly in the text rather than in the bibliography. Refer to the Instructions to authors for Journal of Finance.

Blog post

Andrew, Elise, 2015, Black Hole Winds Might Regulate Size of Galaxy, IFLScience (IFLScience).

Reports

This example shows the general structure used for government reports, technical reports, and scientific reports. If you can't locate the report number then it might be better to cite the report as a book. For reports it is usually not individual people that are credited as authors, but a governmental department or agency like "U. S. Food and Drug Administration" or "National Cancer Institute".

Government report

Government Accountability Office, 1993, Mass Transit: FTA’s Projections Could Better Reflect State and Local Needs, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC.

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation

Hendricks-Harris, Mary Therese, 2012, Quality Induction: The Effects of Comprehensive Induction on New Teacher Retention and Job Satisfaction, (Lindenwood University, St. Charles, MO).

News paper articles

Unlike scholarly journals, news papers do not usually have a volume and issue number. Instead, the full date and page number is required for a correct reference.

New York Times article

Walsh, Mary Williams, 2016, Puerto Rico Debt Bill Takes Step, New York Times.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text

About the journal

Full journal title	Journal of Finance
Abbreviation	J. Finance
ISSN (print)	0022-1082
ISSN (online)	1540-6261
Scope	Accounting Economics and Econometrics Finance