Six senior finance students assumed the role of research analysts and tested their ability to value a stock, write an initiation-of-coverage report and defend their recommendation to a panel of industry professionals.
An Elon undergraduate student team was among the state finalists in the local CFA Institute Research Challenge hosted by CFA Society North Carolina on Feb. 25 in Greensboro, N.C.
The team comprised of senior finance majors Ken Crew, CJ Hunter, Harrison Rowe, Justin Scott, Samantha Torto and Eric Burgess. They were mentored by Raj Gupta, associate professor of finance and director of the William Garrard Reed Finance Center, and advised by Kate Upton, assistant professor of finance.
The CFA Institute Research Challenge provides students with hands-on mentoring and intensive training in financial analysis. Student teams researched and analyzed Highwoods Properties, Inc. (NYSE:HIW), a publicly-traded real estate investment trust, and presented their findings and recommendations to a panel of industry professionals.
“The CFA Institute Research Challenge Competition was a great way to use what I had learned in prior classes in a ‘real world’ application,” Torto said. “This competition helped me navigate Excel in order to value the company, and also enhanced my professional skills throughout the written recommendation piece as well as the presentation in front of successful CFA designation holders and other universities. This experience was extremely unique from any class I had taken at Elon and was a great way to finish my Finance major!”
Other participating teams included Appalachian State University, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina at Wilmington and N.C. State University.