Stirling team take gold at ‘Investment Olympics’

A team of five MSc students from the University of Stirling have been awarded first place in the UK final of the prestigious global Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) Institute Research Challenge.

Considered to be the ‘Investment Olympics’ for university students the team from Stirling Management School defeated competition including SAID Business School - Oxford University, Imperial College Business School - Imperial College London and CASS Business School - City University, London.

Commending the team, Professor Gerry McCormac, principal and vice-chancellor of the University of Stirling said: “Stirling University is unique in having reached the UK final more times than any other competing University. The achievement of our team this year, and in previous years, is testament to the quality of our students and the excellent teaching and support that they receive. I’m delighted the team have reached the global final and I wish them all the very best.”

The initial stage of the challenge requires teams to assume the role of investment analysts and produce a report with a buy, hold or sell recommendation. The team from Stirling Management School presented their research into FTSE-100 company Reckitt Benckiser Group plc to a panel of expert judges at Thomson Reuters HQ in London’s Canary Wharf and were awarded the top spot.

Dr Kevin Campbell, programme director of MSc in Investment Analysis, said:“This is a fantastic achievement by our students, who demonstrated real insight in their company analysis. At the final they presented their findings in a succinct and convincing manner and fielded questions from the panel of professional analysts with composure in what was a high-pressure environment.”

The Stirling team of Kwabena Boasiako (Ghana), QuynhHuong Nguyen (Vietnam), Chris Brown (UK), Ting Hu (China), and Xinyi Yao (China) are studying the MSc in Investment Analysis - a Program Partner of the CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst) Institute.

They will now travel to Chicago in April where they will represent the UK against student teams from around the world in the culmination of the global competition.

The students are the eighth Stirling University team in nine years to compete in the UK Final of the competition.

The team was mentored for the ninth successive year by Jim Campbell, a 1992 graduate of Stirling’s Investment Analysis programme.