jfm-workflow

JFM Workflow Router (jfm-workflow)

Overview

This is the router for a manuscript aimed at the Journal of Financial Markets (JFM) — Elsevier's specialized field journal for market microstructure and the functioning of financial markets: liquidity, price formation and discovery, order flow, trading-mechanism and venue design, high-frequency dynamics, market-based asset pricing, and market regulation. JFM rewards papers built on deep institutional knowledge of how markets actually trade plus a careful empirical design on market data (TAQ/order-book/proprietary feeds) or microstructure theory. It is small, fast, and specialist — not a broad-finance generalist.

The single most useful thing this router does is keep you from mis-targeting. The fatal JFM error is submitting a paper whose mechanism is corporate finance, broad asset pricing, or banking with a thin "and we look at liquidity" wrapper. JFM referees are microstructure insiders; the mechanism, not the dataset, must be about market trading.

Verify volatile process facts before relying on them: publisher Elsevier; submission via Editorial Manager (检索于 2026-06；以官网为准); review model double-blind 待核实; ISSN 1386-4181 (print) / 1878-576X (online). Editor names, abstract/length limits, APC: 待核实.

When to trigger

• A user asks "what should I do next?" on a markets/microstructure paper
• A draft is ping-ponging between mechanism framing, data design, exhibits, and the response letter
• The team is weighing JFM against JF / JFE / RFS (broad top-3) or JFQA
• A JFM decision letter arrived and revision mode must start
• A reviewer says the paper "is not really microstructure" and fit is in doubt

Routing table

Current symptom	Next skill
Is this even a microstructure/markets question, or broad finance?	jfm-topic-selection
Contribution vs. the microstructure frontier is fuzzy or oversold	jfm-literature-positioning
Causal claim rests on OLS+controls or a fragile event window	jfm-identification
Liquidity/price-impact measures, sample filters, or TAQ cleaning are shaky	jfm-empirical-design
Results may be spec-, sample-, microstructure-noise-, or inference-sensitive	jfm-robustness
Spread/depth/impact exhibits are dense or do not answer the question	jfm-tables-figures
Supporting material is too thin or sprawling for the Internet Appendix	jfm-internet-appendix
Intro/abstract bury the mechanism; prose misses the JFM voice	jfm-writing-style
Close to submission; need an Editorial Manager preflight	jfm-submission
Want to anticipate the microstructure referee's objections	jfm-referee-strategy
A decision letter / report needs a response plan	jfm-rebuttal

Default order

jfm-topic-selection → jfm-literature-positioning → jfm-identification → jfm-empirical-design → jfm-robustness → jfm-tables-figures → jfm-internet-appendix → jfm-writing-style → jfm-submission → jfm-referee-strategy → jfm-rebuttal

jfm-writing-style is late polish: do not rewrite the intro before the mechanism, measurement, and identification settle. jfm-referee-strategy is best run before submission as a pre-mortem, then again to plan the jfm-rebuttal.

Routing by paper archetype

The binding constraint differs sharply by the kind of microstructure paper. Read the archetype, enter the chain at the right link.

Archetype	Likely first bottleneck	Enter at
Empirical microstructure (TAQ/order book)	liquidity/impact measurement + sample filters	jfm-empirical-design
Market-structure event (tick-size, reg change, venue entry)	identification off the exogenous shock	jfm-identification
Microstructure theory (Kyle/Glosten-Milgrom lineage)	mapping model objects to testable market predictions	jfm-literature-positioning → jfm-writing-style
Market-based asset pricing (liquidity premia, limits-to-arbitrage)	distinguishing from a broad-AP story for JF/RFS	jfm-topic-selection
HFT / fast-trading / latency	data granularity + venue/clock alignment	jfm-empirical-design → jfm-robustness

Worked routing example (illustrative)

A user says: "My paper shows a new order type tightens spreads, but a referee called the result a measurement artifact and said liquidity is endogenous to the venue's launch." That is two distinct JFM pushbacks owned by different skills. The endogeneity charge is an identification problem — route first to jfm-identification to exploit the staggered venue rollout as the identifying variation and cluster correctly. The artifact charge is a measurement problem — route to jfm-empirical-design to construct alternative spread measures, then jfm-robustness to show the effect (say it settles at 9-14 bps across constructs, illustrative) survives. Only once both are solid do you return to jfm-tables-figures to present the event study and jfm-rebuttal to write the response. Prose polish (jfm-writing-style) waits until last.

Minimal decision snippet

if decision_letter_arrived:          -> jfm-rebuttal (plan via jfm-referee-strategy)
elif ready_to_submit:                -> jfm-submission
elif exhibits_unclear:               -> jfm-tables-figures
elif appendix_or_replication:        -> jfm-internet-appendix
elif results_fragile:                -> jfm-robustness
elif measurement_shaky:              -> jfm-empirical-design
elif endogeneity_or_causal:          -> jfm-identification
elif contribution_fuzzy:             -> jfm-literature-positioning
elif fit_in_doubt:                   -> jfm-topic-selection
else:                                -> jfm-topic-selection

Anti-patterns

• Treating JFM as interchangeable with JF, JFE, or RFS — those are broad top-3; JFM is the microstructure specialist
• Listing a general asset-pricing or corporate-finance paper as a JFM exemplar
• Polishing prose before the trading mechanism and measurement are stable
• Letting the Internet Appendix carry a claim the main text must establish
• Quoting an editor name, fee, or word limit not in resources/official-source-map.md and not marked 待核实

Output format

【Target】Journal of Financial Markets (JFM) — microstructure specialist
【Archetype】empirical micro / market-structure event / theory / market-AP / HFT
【Current bottleneck】fit / contribution / identification / measurement / robustness / exhibits / appendix / style / submission / revision
【Next skill】<one jfm-* skill>
【Reason】why this is the binding constraint at this stage
【Source check】official facts verified or marked 待核实