The students of the Business School of the National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST) have excelled in the Asia-Pacific regional final of the 2011 Global Investment Research Challenge, (IRC) hosted by the CFA Institute. The challenge was held in Bali, Indonesia during the last week of February 2011.
More than 500 universities from around the world have participated this year in local competitions as part of the Global IRC. They included more than 600 students from 142 universities from Asia-Pacific region alone. NUST students won the Pakistani Chapter of the Global IRC in which all the leading business schools of Pakistan competed. After winning the Pakistani Chapter of the competition, the NUST team advanced to the Asia Pacific regional championship, held in Bali, Indonesia and represented Pakistan.
In the Asia Pacific regional final held in Indonesia, 16 teams, the winners of local competitions in Japan, South Korea, Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Australia and New Zealand took part in the regional competition. The event was sponsored by the Indonesia Stock Exchange, Bank Mandiri and Telkom Indonesia.
After the first round of the championship, only six teams were selected for the Asia Pacific final. It was indeed an honour for NUST as well as for Pakistan that its team was amongst the six finalists. The six teams reaching the final included: NUST (Pakistan), University of the Philippines (the Philippines), Thammasat University (Thailand), Indian Institute of Management Shillong (India), University of Sri Jayawardenepura (Sri Lanka), and Messey University (New Zealand).
After intense competition, Thammasat University, Thailand was declared the winner of Asia Pacific Regional Global IRC. The Thai team will compete against three other regional champions from the Americas; Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA), and New York in April, 2011. The grand final of Global IRC will be held in Omaha, Nebraska, in the United States where investment guru Warren Buffet will be the guest of honour at the event.
In the Global IRC, students conducted a detailed analysis of a listed company and presented their work before the international panel of judges comprising leading finance professionals, who held the students to real world professional standards in analysis and ethics. The judges were from Indonesia, Japan, Singapore, China and Australia. The Judges commented that "the quality of presentations was outstanding, and all the six finalist performed extremely well".
Dr Ashvin Vibhakar, Managing Director of Asia Pacific Operations commented: "The purpose of this competition was to prepare future leaders in the investment profession. Through the Global IRC, the future generation of investment professionals comes to know the rigor and high ethical standards required in investment management".
Students from the Business School of the NUST took part in the local as well as in the regional Championship included Ammar Arshad, Ayesha Arshad, Samra Khan, Sara Agha and Shayan Zahid. They conducted a detailed analysis of the Hub Power Company (HUBCO).-PR