The Golden Trio (from left) Lau Hou
Chun, Ong Seong Lik and How Chao Xun
The Golden Trio team from UTAR
Faculty of Business and Finance (FBF),
consisting of Bachelor of Finance (Honours) students Ong Seong Lik and Lau
Hou Chun, and Bachelor of Economics (Honours) student How Chao Xun, won
first place in the Stockholm School of Economics (SSE) Riga Finance
Challenge (FC) 2021. This Challenge was jointly organised by SSE Riga iFund,
SSE Riga Student Association, Capitalia, and Financial Modelling World Cup
(FMWC) and it was held from 25 May to 12 June 2021 via Google Meet to all
international participants.
This SSE Riga Finance Challenge is an international competition for
high-school and university students from all over the world and it is unique
in the Baltics, and this competition has always been a summit of knowledge.
The aim of the competition was to gather students and bring international
competitive spirit into SSE Riga, and it serves as a milestone for checking
the knowledge and comparing participants themselves against an international
benchmark. It also provided a platform for participants to foster
international friendship and knowledge sharing. The Stockholm School of
Economics in Riga (SSE Riga) is a business school in Riga, Latvia, founded
in 1994 by the Stockholm
School of Economics and the Latvian Government.
This year, a total of 348
international participants consisting of 92 teams from 31 countries and 77
universities participated in the competition. This made it even more
meaningful when the UTAR team of three FBF students, participating under
their group name Golden Trio, emerged as the overall Champion in the grand
final and won the 700 Euro cash prize.
The team, along with other contestants, were challenged to complete a range
of tasks on Corporate Finance, Financial Reporting and Analysis, Valuation,
Investment Banking and Portfolio Management. The competition consisted of
two preliminary rounds and the grand finals. The top 12 teams were selected
to take part in round two after the preliminary round, followed by the grand
finals. The finalists had to present to the panel of judges.
Lau Hou Chun was excited with the win and praised his team mates, “I am
grateful and fortunate to have such good friends as my teammates who invited
me to participate in this competition. We did not expect to win any prizes,
and we participated with the aim to gain experience. However, we all put in
our best efforts and our teamwork was very good. With the strong fundamental
basic knowledge in financial modelling provided through our programme
studies and with sheer hard work, we were able to win. We are very happy
with this victory.”
Ong Seong Lik added his comments, “I came across this competition from a
recommendation by a UTAR alumni, Jeff, who is also the founder of UTAR
Finance and Investment Society (FIS). FIS had previously invited him to
conduct a workshop teaching financial modelling knowledge. Therefore, the
knowledge we gained from the workshop, as well as the lessons we learnt from
our degree programme has enabled us to apply our skills and knowledge very
well, and made us stand out from the other contestants.”
Agreeing with Ong, was How Chao Xun, who said that, “I participated in one
competition named CFA Institute Research Challenge, where the UTAR team was
led by FBF lecturer, Mr Lim Chong Heng. He taught me a lot on valuation and
financial modelling knowledge, which I think played a crucial role for us to
secure this win in the competition. Through my degree studies, I also gained
better analytical skills and knowledge on real-life business and finance
cases. These helped me to answer the questions during the Q&A session of the
competition. Therefore, I feel very blessed and happy with the victory and I
could not have done it without my teammates. As a team competition, our
teamwork, effort and past experiences we gained in UTAR are key factors that
helped us to perform so well. However, this victory is not the end of the
road, as we will continue to strive to improve ourselves.”
In the SSE Riga Finance Challenge, the Golden Trio team was tasked to
present a case on the company “Provision of Pellets Inc”. They were required
to solve financial problems based on the tasks given, and had to apply the
knowledge and techniques of financial modelling to forecast and make
valuation for the company. The Golden Trio team built an integrated annual
model for the company for the next 5 years (2021-2025) using the historical
data and assumptions given by the organiser. The team was then given 10
minutes in round two to present their main findings and defend their
presentation to the panel of judges.
UTAR is very proud of the FBF Golden Trio for wining this international SSE
Riga Finance Challenge 2021 and congratulates them for their excellent
performance.
The official announcement on the Golden Trio’s
victory in social media
Golden Trio’s presentation title during the Challenge
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