Rate My Professor Hiroaki Suenaga

Dr. Hiroaki Suenaga is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Accounting, Economics and Finance within the Faculty of Business and Law at Curtin University. He also serves as Deputy Director of Graduate Research in the school. Suenaga earned his PhD in Agricultural and Resource Economics from the University of California, Davis in 2005, along with an MSc in Agricultural Economics and a BSoc. He joined Curtin University in 2006 as a Research Fellow in Energy Economics and has since advanced to his current senior lecturing role. His research focuses on price and volatility dynamics of energy and other primary commodities, as well as econometric analysis of micro data from network industries. Suenaga teaches courses such as Econometric Principles (ECOM2000).

Suenaga's scholarly contributions include key publications such as 'Homeownership and subjective well-being: Are the links heterogeneous across location, age and income?' (2024, with Rachel Ong ViforJ and Ryan Brierty), 'Online and offline health information seeking and the demand for physician services' (2022), 'Volatility dynamics of NYMEX natural gas futures prices' (2008), 'A Panel Cointegration Analysis of the Dynamics of FX Option Implied Volatility Surface' (2015), and 'Misspecification in term structure models of commodity prices: Implications for hedging price risk' (2011). His work has garnered approximately 148 citations. He has secured funding through the Australian Research Council Discovery Project DP1094499 ($193,361) in collaboration with Professor Harry Bloch, investigating innovation, commodity prices, and business cycles. Suenaga contributes to collaborative research projects, including 'Energy Transition and Gender Equality in Australia and South Africa' with colleagues Helen Cabalu, Julian Inchauspe, and Khuong Truong. He has served on the program committee for the ESAM2019 conference and engaged in international research visits, such as to the University of Pretoria's Energy Economics Research Unit in 2025 to strengthen collaborations.