Bissett Insider

Bissett Professor Tashfeen Hussain has two papers accepted for presentation at Houston conference

Bissett Assistant  Professor, Tahsfeen Hussain, has had two papers accepted for presentation in the South Western Finance Association Conference to be held in Houston in March. The papers to be presented are: “Do Credit Default Swaps Impact Lenders’ Monitoring on Loans?” and “Board Interlock and Fraud Restatement Spillover”. The SWFA Conference is a highly reputed finance conference.

 

2018 -2019 Bissett CFA Scholarship Recipients

As part of the CFA Institute University Affiliation Program membership, the Bissett School of Business is able to award CFA Level Exam Scholarships through the Financial Analysis Concentration.

The finance department has been allocated 15 scholarships for the December 2018 and June 2019 exams. Each scholarship is worth an approximate $900 USD and is administered by the CFA Institute.

The Scholarship selections were made by a committee consisting of Bissett Associate Professors in Finance Allan Dwyer, Carlton Osakwe and Cathy Roy-Heaton. In addition to the requirement of the student recipients being in their final year of studies (BBA GM Major with a Financial Analysis Concentration), the committee also factored in career ambitions and their contribution to the finance program during their time at MRU.

December 2018 Examination: Michael Croft, Shahla (Shay) Hussain, Dylan Nemeth, Fabjan Pepaj.

June 2019 Examinations: Michael Boulter, Quinn Bromley, James (David) Carlson, Maxim Chiguy, Serge Combot, Syed(Jay) Hussain, Ahsan Khan, Riley McCallum, Victor Power-Romero, John (Cam) Price, Austin Vrabel.

Congratulations to all of our student recipients and thank you to the committee for their time and attention given to their thoughtful selections!

MRU FSO and RMA host inaugural RMA Alberta Commercial Lending Case Competition at MRU

On September 27 and 29, the Risk Management Association of Alberta ( “RMA”) and the MRU Financial Students’ Organization (“FSO”) co-hosted the inaugural RMA Alberta Commercial Lending Case Competition on the MRU campus. This competition was modeled after RMA competitions which have been held in the United States.
The event was only open to MRU students.  Thirty two BBA students ( primarily financial analysis and financial services ) signed up and were assigned to 8 teams, each team having an industry mentor (a local commercial lender or banking executive ) who provided each team individualized assistance with their analysis.  the event also included a 75 minute “Commercial Lending 101” seminar, lead by a leading local banker from RBC.
The main portion of the competition had the student teams analyze a provided scenario with both qualitative and quantitative methods to produce a recommendation in an executive summary and commercial lending term sheet.  The mentors provided one hour of limited assistance to their team during the four hours.    Each team then presented their executive summary and term sheet to a panel of judges, over a 10 minute presentation and an 8 minute question and answer period.   The judging panels consisted of local credit risk and banking executives.
The top three teams were:
FIRST: $1400 prize : Team B: Austin Vrabel, Riley McCallum, Connor Nodrick ( 2nd year), Gurdit Khatra
SECOND: $1000 prize: Team E: Sam Lonnberg, Matthew Lonnberg ( 2nd year), Shameel Damji (3rd year), Joseph Neil
THIRD: $600 prize: Team F: Cam Devlin, Ahsan Khan, James Carlson, Enma Calderon ( 2nd year)
The RMA raised funds from several local financial institutions to cover the $3000 prize pool, exceeding expectations!
“Our students were outstanding ambassadors of our program.  Our RMA partners, the judges and the mentors spoke with me throughout the two days of the event and said glowing things about our students: the quality of the analysis, their eagerness to learn and their professionalism were all noted.  In total, 17 corporate-commercial bankers and credit risk professionals came to our campus and worked with our students in some capacity over the two days of the event”  — Catherine Roy-Heaton.
Catherine would like to thank all the industry partners, volunteers and students who made the event the success it was. Special Thanks to Catherine for her continued mentor-ship of the Finance students and the MRU FSO.

Bissett Associate Professor, Catherine Roy Heaton appointed for a 3 year term to the UAC of the AcSB

The Bissett School of Business wishes to congratulate Associate Professor, Cathy Roy Heaton for her recent appointment to the User Advisory Council (UAC) of the Accounting Standards Board of Canada (AcSB).  Cathy has been appointed for a three year term.
The UAC’s purpose is to “assist the AcSB in understanding how users, including investors and investment professionals, credit granters in financial institutions, equity and credit analysts, and rating agencies, use financial information. The Council is also intended to assist the AcSB by providing advice on standard-setting priorities, and on specific agenda projects.”
The combination of Cathy’s academic background and her finance and business career have proven to make her an ideal candidate. As the only academic on the current council, Cathy is excited to bring her academia perspective to this new role.
Congratulations Cathy!

Bissett Accounting Finance Department hosts Bringing Voices Together: Diversity and Inclusion in Accounting and Finance

Sponsored by the CPA Education Foundation, the Bissett Accounting & Finance Department, spearheaded by Assistant Professor Nicole Edge, hosted “Bringing Voices Together: Diversity & Inclusion in Accounting & Finance” on March 16, 2018. A group of ~ 50 registrants including experienced professionals, alumnae and students came together over lunch to share stories about experiences working as women in a male-dominated profession.

Robin Taub,  author, speaker, writer, “solopreneur” and former Chair of CPA Canada’s Women’s Leadership Council, provided current Canadian context on gender diversity and the business case for why Canada needs to take action to address gender diversity. She and Ruth McHugh, current COO of the Alberta Office of the Auditor General, then shared their stories of what it was like for them to enter this discipline and carve out their own space as CPAs. The conversation then moved to small round-table discussion where students had an opportunity to engage with professionals and discuss a range of questions and ideas about gender diversity and inclusion in the profession.

Nicole reports that based on positive feedback – particularly from students who felt this was one of their first opportunities to hear directly from the “on-the-ground” practitioners about these issues, options for follow-up events are being explored.

Special thanks to Nicole for spearheading this event and ensuing this timely issue is at the forefront of the faculty.

The annual Bissett Stock Market Challenge sees a record number of student participants

The ATB Investor Services Investment Challenge, otherwise known as the Bissett Stock Market competition, wrapped up at the end of March after seven months. Starting in September 2017, this year saw a record number of 33 teams compete.

The winning team of Austin Glenn, Lucy Javorcikova, and Harrison Lane had an outstanding return of 92%. The second place team of Jarett Bishop, Rob Flach, and Graham Perry managed an impressive 54% return, and the third place team of David Carlson, Amy Gillies, and Ahsan Khan were close behind with a return of 44%. All three teams are the recipients of cash prizes. The winning team is immortalized by having their names inscribed on the Stock market competition trophy. This year’s competition was the 13th edition of the popular competition.

Congratulations to the students and special thanks to Jim Fischer, Associate Professor and faculty adviser for the competition!

Bissett students win 2018 CFA Society Winnipeg Ethics Challenge!

Bissett School of Business would like to congratulate the winning team of the 2018 CFA Society Winnipeg Ethics Challenge: Dylan Assen, Tiffany Doyle, Harrison Kozak, Andy McAuley, Graham Perry and Faculty Adviser, Catherine Roy Heaton.

Winners, 2018 CFA Winnipeg Ethics Challenge, Mount Royal

Our Bissett team competed against six other universities that are members of the CFA Institute University affiliation program and/or embed financial ethics into their curriculum. Those institutions include the  University of Alberta, University of Calgary, University of Saskatchewan, University of Manitoba and the University of Winnipeg.

“The teams had four weeks to analyze and evaluate a case which presented several ethical dilemmas and then identify the violations of the CFA Institute Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct.”  Students presented their findings, gave recommendations and were grilled by a panel of industry professionals.  Bissett Chair and faculty adviser of the team, Catherine Roy Heaton,  indicated the students excelled through their preparation and work ethics, teamwork, strong presentation skills, comprehension of the Code and Standards and the ability to apply their learned acumen to “real world applications” is what made them the stand out team.

The team will be representing Bissett at Nationals in Vancouver this coming May, competing against the top teams from across Canada. Bissett School of Business  wishes the students a successful showing in Vancouver and would like to extend our thanks to Cathy for her continued dedication and mentor-ship to the CFA Ethics team!

 

Bissett School of Business students participate in a town hall consultation with the Federal Minister of Finance

In its budget consultation process (#budget2017), the Federal Government presented students the opportunity to discuss and share ideas with the Federal Minister of Finance, Bill Moreau. A number of our own Bissett business students tool the opportunity to particiapate in the Google town hall consultation.

The video is available on online at the following link: http://budget-lebudget.ca/

 

Finance Students looking forward to upcoming events

The 12th Annual ATB Investor Services Investment Challenge, otherwise known as the Bissett Stock Market Competition, is up and running. Students in teams of three have until March 31, 2017 to maximize their returns in a real-time simulation. The members of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place teams win cash prizes and a luncheon with members of ATB Investor Services. The 1st place team is also immortalized on the Stock Market Competition trophy. The competition is grateful to ATB for their support of this competition. For more details, contact Jim Fischer.
 
 
The Financial Students Organization (FSO) has undertaken some fund raising initiatives this semester. On a challenge from Jim Fischer, the FSO is attempting to raise $2,000 to be split evenly between the Terry Fox Foundation and the United Way. If they are successful, the stakes are a public shaving of Jim’s beard on October 25! This much anticipated event will take place in the Bissett 2nd floor atrium at 12:00 noon. Refreshment will be provided.