Finance Students Advance at CFA Research Challenge
ALBANY, N.Y. (April 2, 2024) — A team of undergraduates from the Massry School of Business is entering new territory in the annual CFA Institute Research Challenge.
In February, students Sophia Hofer, Kevin Holder, Tyler Rico, Ashar Zahid and team leader Nohl Schwandtner took home joint first place in the CFA-New York competition, which featured winning teams from throughout the eastern United States.
In March, the team won again to become one of three schools to represent the eastern U.S. at the Americas-region finals. Now, UAlbany, Canisius and Babson will compete with 13 other schools from throughout the U.S., Canada, the Atlantic islands and Latin America on April 2 for a spot in the global finals in May.
The finals of the annual international competition, which provides hands-on mentoring and intensive training in financial analysis and professional ethics, will be held in Warsaw, Poland.
The New York competition had an unusually large number of teams at 23, which provided for two winners to be declared: UAlbany and Seton Hall.
“This is the second UAlbany team in four years to make it to the semifinal round, and I’m thrilled that this year’s terrific students broke through,” said UAlbany Professor and Chair of Finance David Smith after the team won in February. “Given this team’s knowledge and work ethic, I’m optimistic about their chances in the next stage of the competition.”
In the CFA-New York competition, all teams prepared detailed research and valuation reports on a single company: Dollar Tree, Inc. Wall Street equity analysts evaluated the reports and assigned scores. The top 16 teams moved on to the presentation stage. The UAlbany team presented their investment thesis and fielded judges’ questions via Zoom on three separate days, making the cut as the pool was whittled to eight, then four, and finally the two winning teams.
The five undergraduate students are leaders in the UASBIG student-managed investment group, an extracurricular club whose members apply financial modeling and valuation skills in managing a $400,000 real-money stock portfolio.
“The CFA Institute Research Challenge is an extremely valuable experiential learning opportunity for our students, allowing them to gain real-world experience in the role of a research analyst,” said Massry School of Business Interim Dean Kevin Williams. “The mentoring and intensive training in financial analysis that they have received as part of this challenge is invaluable – the skills and confidence they gained will help launch their careers.”
The sub-regional round, broken up into three breakout groups, required a video submission from each team.
“We are immensely proud of the team’s accomplishments and very excited to see them advance,” continued Williams. “The students and their faculty advisor, Professor David Smith, have put in an incredible amount of time and effort since last fall. It is wonderful to see their hard work, dedication, and collaboration pay off.”