Finance students in the past have participated in national student competitions. They are a great opportunity to practice and further your knowledge and skills you learned in the finance program at PSU. Because not all of you are finance major, grading will be generous as long as you follow the instructions (e.g., number counts for answers). In addition, it’s not a technical assignment. It’s an opportunity to look back and evaluate what you have learned, how they can be useful, and what else you should learn. Remember you chose finance as your major because you like something about finance. Follow your passion and keep learning what excites you, and you will have a bright future ahead of you. This is the last assignment of this course. Thank you for working hard in this course for the past 7 weeks.
Q1 What is the title of the finance student competition you may consider competing?
The title of the finance student competition that I would consider competing in would be the CFO Global Case Study presented by Charter Quest.
Q2 Describe the eligibility requirements, if any (e.g., undergraduate college student).
There are no listed requirements for the CFO Global Case Study challenge as an undergrad student. This means it is an event open entry and anyone can apply as a current undergrade student that is enrolled in a college instution.
Q3 What are the competition criteria?
The criteria of the competition is Section 1: About the competitions Section 2: Participant, team eligibility and registration Section 3: Communication Section 4: Competition format & stages Section 5: Penalties and non-compliance Section 6: Intellectual property Section 7: Consent and release Section 8: Disclaimers Section 9: Official prize, prize transfer or substitution Section 10: Applicable laws and jurisdiction Section 11: Adjudication and outcomes
Q4 What is the deadline for the submission?
The Deadline for the Submission is March 31 2022.
Q5 Why are you interested in this competition?
The reason why I am interested in this competition is because it stood out in comparison to every other competition. On the website, it stated: “It challenges university students around the world to prove they can compete at the highest level: by solving a set of complex and integrated finance, operational, strategic and ethical problems that beset a real-world global business in the emerging markets”(Sourced Via Charterquest.com)
It was fairly intruiging to me due to being able to compete on an international level.
Q6 What would be a possible project you may turn in for the competition? Describe it in at least 100 words.
The project is not publicly posted until the start date of the challenge. This allows students to not be able to prepare which shows their truest output. It would be hard to project exactly what my submission could be, however it would be able to solve finance, operation, strategic and ethic problems to the best of my ability. My expectations would be that they propose problems from numerous different companies and request them to be solved to the best of the teams abilities. They then judge based on how these problems either have been proposed to be solved or have been solved by professionals in these fields. Last year they did problems based on Volkswagen and specifically their “Dieselgate” issue.
Q7 List things that you learned in financial modeling course that could be helpful for your project in Q6. Describe it in at least 100 words.
Financial modeling at Plymouth state university, I believe would be a tremendous help in this kind of situation for a competition. Everything I have learned with R studio is a significant asset. The ability to load, sort, manipulate and analyze data in hundreds or even thousands of different ways is an enormous upper hand to anyone that is not familiar with the R studio program. I think Module 6, Portfolio analysis was the most helpful section as it ties everything we have learned in this course together, and shows us how to apply and integrate all these skills at the same time, to get the best results.
Q8 List things that you learned in other finance courses at PSU that could be helpful for your project in Q6. Describe it in at least 100 words.
Financial management and investment priciples have helped me become very familiar with the financial calculator. Being able to use the financial calculator so efficiently and effectively has become a great tangeble asset that I will take with me when I graduate. I am able to calculate P/E ratios, CAPM ratios, and be able to find out what interest payments I would be paying with specific inputs. This would benefit me for my project when trying to figure out what the best loan options would be for a business loan to help expand the company. I could also calculate how much my machinery is depreciating per year and when would be a good time to buy a new machine to help production.
Q9 Check the finance blog below and see if you see any post that may be helpful for your project in Q6. Discuss how it can be helpful in at least 100 words. Hint: The author of the blog writes articles on financial analysis using R. https://rviews.rstudio.com/categories/reproducible-finance-with-r/
“IPO Exploration’s” Part 1, 2, and Portfolio’s and Benchmark caught my attention as these are the start-up stages of a company becoming available to public. The initial public offering of many companies are often announced in the even a company is in need of money to continue rapid expansion. This allows companies to borrow money from investors. I think that these articles impeticular are beneficial as they address what challenges companies may encounter by becoming public, and how one can manipulate and analyze the data in R Studio. It instructs in further detail how to chart data from Open, Close, High, and Low stock prices and total volume. It is a valuable article and tool to take into consideration when attempting to achieve a Finance Competition.
Q10 List things that you think could be helpful but not taught/offered at PSU finance courses. Discuss how it can be helpful in at least 100 words.
At Plymouth State, I wish I learned more about how to be personable. I feel like there are two sides of finance - one is very independent, data crunching, assessing, and analyzation. The other is being very personable with clients and being able to gain client trust when you are dealing with their money, retirement, etc. I think it would be extremely useful to have a Corperate Finance Discussions class. A course that helps solidify your educational skills with your personable skills. Being able to talk to all walks of life. Being able to gain trust in your clients is crucial and I feel like that is a skill I have not exercised yet.