Bissett Insider

Bissett Stock Market Competition 2020 Winners Announced

Jim Fischer, Bisset Associate Professor of Finance, has announced the much anticipated results of the annual Bissett Stock Market Challenge:

The team of Varune Tillekeratne, Jamal Hussaini and Bidzina Mosiashvili has won the 2019-2020 Bissett Stock Market Competition with a stunning return of 78%.

The 14th edition of the annual competition began in September 2019 and concluded March 31, 2020. This year 14 teams of three students each started the competition with $1,000,000 in virtual money. Through the use of a simulator, they traded in Canadian and US markets, with the ability to sell short and use options. This year was characterized by five months of trading in what would become the end of the longest bull market in history, followed by a month that witnessed the quickest decline into a bear market in history. The TSX Composite Index ended the same time period down 20%.

The winners claim a record of their own. They beat the market by the highest margin achieved by a team since the competition started in 2005. The previous record was made in 2009 by the team of Nicole Rumley, Owen Watson and Brandon Thomson. That team posted a return of 25% when the market indexes were down 35% over the same time period, reeling in the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis.

The winners will be presented with the trophy for the competition at a future date, when university operations return to normal.

Bissett would like to congratulate the winners and all participants as well as extend a thank you to Jim Fischer for his continued mentorship of the students and the running of this competition; not only an impactful learning experience, but a rite of passage for many of our finance students!

Bissett International Business professors Frank Cotae and Jacqueline Musabende have research published

 

Frank Cotae, PhD.,  and Jacqueline Musabende, PhD.,  have had their article titled “A Multi-Country Student and Instructor Review of GlobalDNA Simulation as an Experiential Learning Tool for International Business Courses” accepted as competitive at the 2020 Academy of International Business (AIB) Annual Meeting. This is the 4th year in a row that they have had their research accepted at the AIB Annual Conference. Congratulations to Frank and Jacqueline!

Congratulations again to Jaqueline for another successful semester of partnering her Winter 2020 International Marketing (INBU 3302) students with CUSO International, completing a live experiential consulting project for Tegucigalpa, Honduras. The project resulted in the design of a regional park, a solar energy plant, an urban water purification system and a marketing plan that is ready for developmental funding. This resulted in 70 students receiving a Certificate from CUSO, adding to the 200 strong recipients of this distinction.

Also, congratulations to Frank as he has co-authored a textbook for International Business courses. The textbook is expected to arrive in the bookstores soon!

Cotae, F., Hill, C., Hult, T. and McKaig, T. (2021). Global Business Today. 6th Canadian Edition. McGraw Hill Education.

Bissett students place second in CPA Business Challenge

The CPA Business Challenge case competition was held on Friday, March 7, 2020, in Calgary.

A total of 15 teams representing the University of Calgary, University of Lethbridge, University of Alberta, SAIT, NAIT, MacEwan University, Athabasca University and of course, our two Bissett teams from Mount Royal University participated in this prestigious case competition sponsored by the CPA Education Foundation (CPAEF).

This year, one of our two teams from the Bissett School of Business was placed second overall, which comes with a cash prize of $5,000. An outstanding achievement indeed! Our team that was placed second overall was comprised of the following four students:

Ben Barfuss
Martin Keskin
Chantelle Linares
Linda Tran

The students presented their case with poise and in a very organized fashion. Their analysis of the case was solid and in-depth. The team members confidently answered all questions from the judges. They were fantastic, and without a doubt, the team is worthy of this recognition.

The success of our students is not only indicative of their talent, hard work, and professionalism but also of the rigor of our accounting program and mentorship by our dedicated professors who continue to educate students to strive to attain excellence. (This is the second year in a row that a Bissett team has placed high in this prestigious competition!) Special thanks to our three Accounting faculty, including Rafik Kurji, Simon Magennis and, Osama El-Temtamy, for their hard work, coaching, guidance, and mentorship.

The Bissett School of Business sincerely thanks CPAEF for their generous support over the many years. Thanks to all and congratulations!

Four Bissett Finance students receive scholarships from the Risk Management Association scholarship program!

Congratulations to our four Bissett School of Business students who have received RMA scholarships for the 2019-20 academic year! Then recipients are Angelique Develle, Mohsen Esmaili, Alex Campbell and Luke McKinlay.

The application and winning of scholarships has been an indirect benefit of the RMA Commercial Lending Case Competition  as the competition has created awareness and promotion of the RMA Foundation student scholarships.  This scholarship program is based in the US, is open to Canadian and U.S. students who intend to pursue careers in banking. The selection process is competitive.
For the 2019-2020 academic year, The Foundation awarded scholarships to 92 new students totalling $154,000 USD, and to 22 repeat recipients totalling $55,000 USD. The Scholars represent 83 universities. Overall, The Foundation awards totalled $209,000 with individual awards in the $1,500 to $5,000 range.

 

Learn more about RMA’s Academic Program initiatives, including The Foundation Scholarship and free RMA Student Membership, on their Student Resource Center website.

Bissett students from Social Innovation and Accounting place third in Alberta Not-for-Profit Association case competition

Bissett students, Mia Baines, Jan Santiago (Accounting Majors) and Kolten Nelson and Xander Jensen (Social Innovation program) placed third in the Alberta Not-for-Profit Association (ANPA) case competition at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. The students, who had been preparing for the competition since late November 2019, were mentored by Catherine Pearl PhD, (Social Innovation) and Simon Magennis, BSc, CPA, (Accounting). The Bissett faculty mentors were contacted by the organizers based on previous involvement in student case competitions. This was the first time that Bissett participated in the ANPA case competition.

L to R: Catherine Pearl (faculty, MRU); Alexander Jensen (student, MRU); Simon Magennis (faculty, MRU); Jan Santiago (student, MRU); Mia Bains (student, MRU); Kolten Nelson (student, MRU); Bob Wyatt (CEO, Muttart Foundation)

 

 

The competition took place from Wednesday, February 26 to Sunday, March 1 and involved students from eight universities (seven Canadian, and one from Indiana, U.S.) spending 24 hours analyzing and preparing solutions to a live business problem relating to a local Not-for-Profit organization. They presented their solutions firstly in a preliminary round and then a four-team final, to a judging panel made up of representatives from the not-for-profit organization, local business, University of Alberta, and the competition sponsor, the Muttart Foundation.

The ANPA has been organizing the not-for-profit business case competition since 2013. Canadian and international universities participate each year. This year’s finalists and prizewinners were from:  1. University of Alberta, 2. McMaster University, 3. Mount Royal University, and 4. Laurentian University. Our team received $2,000 to donate to the charity of their choice.

Congratulations to the Bissett team on their win and a special thank you to the faculty mentors, Simon and Catherine for their commitment and service to our Bissett students!

 

2020 BASS managerial case competition a success

On January 24th, the Bissett Accounting Student Society (BASS) held their annual managerial case competition on campus.
The winners of the competition were as follows:
  • 1st- Linda Tran & Sohaib Abbas
  • 2nd- David Koter & Garret McMullen
  • 3rd- Mezha Sikandar & Aaesha Azhar
1 ST. Place BASS Competition
2nd Place BASS Competition 2020
3rd Place BASS Competition
Congratulations to all the winners and all student participants. Special thank you’s are extended to the BASS executive, the volunteers and  the  judges: Kate Schiller from KPMG, Amy McHarg from Pembina, Dave MacPherson from Bissett School of Business, Kelvin Ng from PwC.

Networking Day 2020: A direct link to the workforce

January 30th seen the latest edition of the Networking Day 2020: A direct link to the workforce  and it was a big success!

Focusing the workshops on building interpersonal skills to aid in effective networking, and providing a conduit to companies actively recruiting through the Career Expo, provided the experiential impact that Bissett School of Business offers our students.

On behalf of the Bissett and Communications Studies faculties, we thank the organization committee, the many faculty, students and staff volunteers as well as our valued alumni for their participation.

ND – Workshop
ND – Finance Workshop
ND – Workshop
ND – Career Expo
ND – Career Expo
ND- Career Expo
ND – Roderick Mah
ND- Supply Chain Breakfast

Bissett student, Mary Serafini receives Canada’s Outstanding CEO of the Year Futures Fund Scholarship

The Bissett School of Business is very proud to have selected Bachelor of Business (BBA- Finance) student, Mary Serafini as their successful candidate for Canada’s Outstanding CEO of the Year Futures Fund Scholarship Award. Bissett was one of 10  business schools across Canada chosen to  award one of their best and brightest students for 2019. The selection was based on students who demonstrated exemplary academic and leadership skills in their extracurricular endeavors. Mary received a $7500.00 bursary and a trip to Toronto to attend the Awards Gala on February 12, 2020.

Mary’s academic success and record of service has been recognized with many academic awards including the MRU President’s Scholarship, Bissett Scholarship for Excellence in Business, Louise McKinney Scholarship and the CFA Program Awareness Scholarship .

In September of 2018 Mary was selected to represent Mount Royal University on the CFA Institute Research Challenge Team; after months of preparation, Mary’s team presented their valuation report to industry judges and was subsequently selected as a finalist in the Canadian Prairies Division. Mary cites this opportunity as one of the highlights of her studies at Bissett School of Business.

A passion for academics and a strong belief in service to others, led Mary to mentoring first year business students in the MRU MAPS Peer Mentorship Program and tutoring finance students through Student Learning Services. Her keen interest in academics and her passion for giving back, has had real impact on the students she has mentored as well as those peers she has worked collaboratively with throughout the first years of her degree .

After her graduation in June of 2020, Mary plans on pursuing her CFA designation and, thereafter, a career in Finance, but also plans to stay connected to Mount Royal through the university’s mentorship program.

Mary represents the very best of today’s Bissett students and tomorrow’s leaders: dedicated, passionate and committed to her community.

Congratulations Mary!

2nd Annual MRU RMA Commercial Lending Case Competition was a huge success

The Risk Management Association of Alberta, in conjunction with the MRU Financial Student Organization (FSO) hosted the second edition of the MRU RMA Alberta Commercial Lending Case Competition this past September. The competition is modeled after RMA competitions held in the United States and MRU is currently the only western Canadian University to offer a case competition in this format.

Building upon the success of  last year’s inaugural event, the organizers were happy to  report a 40% increase in student involvement for this year.  This year’s competition seen  10 teams comprised from 38 Bissett BBA student participants  plus six student volunteers to handle the logistics throughout the event. There were also nineteen RMA commercial credit professional-executives and ten faculty and senior management members in attendance. Each of the teams were provided with a dedicated industry mentor to give individualized advice on their analysis.

It was an outstanding few days of learning, mentor-ship and networking! ” – Cathy Roy-Heaton

Each team was evaluated on their written and oral summary, identification of key risks, mitigation of risks, key ratio and financial analysis of the case, as well as their ability to professionally and concisely communicate their findings and defend their recommendations. The teams were extremely competitive as all ten teams placed within 15% of the first place team and there was only 1.2% differential between the 1st and 3rd placed team!

FIRST: $1400 prizeMatt Carson, Kyle McDonald, Riley Lyster, Connor Studer
SECOND: $1000 prize:  Jacob Frank, Deynira Calderon, Ivonne Abarca, Mohsen Esmaili
THIRD: $600 prize:  Alex MacLean, Alex Campbell, Leutirm Bajraktari, Jared Benoit
The RMA raised funds from several financial institutions and provided a prize pool of $3000.00, exceeding the organizers expectations.
Cathy reports that the RMA partners, the judges, the organizing committee and the mentors were impressed with the quality of the analysis, the students’ eagerness to learn and their professionalism.
Bissett congratulates all of the student participants and sends special thanks to our industry partners that made this event possible. A special thanks to Associate Professor, Cathy Roy Heaton for her leadership and mentoring of the students as well as Associate Professor, Carleton Osakwe,   Associate Professor, Tashfeen Hussain and Chair, Reza Chowdhury.
“Many of the students thanked me for the opportunity to be engaged in this experience. No question this is at the heart of what we stand for in the Bissett School of Business. Thank you for making this an impactful learning experience for our students”  – Dean, Elizabeth Evans

7th Annual JMH LaunchPad Pitch Competition another huge success!

The JMH LaunchPad competition is in its seventh year of recognizing and rewarding MRU student entrepreneurs.  Hosted by the Institute of Innovation an Entrepreneurship, the annual competition has become a 300 seat sell-out event filled with investors, students, and community members who come to see the student entrepreneurs pitch their ventures for a chance at $80,000 in start-up funds (cash and in-kind services). The student entrepreneurs at Mount Royal University continue to impress  and lead in Calgary’s entrepreneurial community.

Participating students were: Gio Moros, E-Cash; Silvia Bezzi, Arielle Fitzgerald, Marc Nzojibwami, Mooch; Gurpartap Baidwan, Move N’Store; Luke Morstad, Outlier Surf & Adventure Co; Tarandeep Singh Kainth, Sharyeo; Kevin Wojcial, Venure Tech Innovations VR; Vladimar Taikov, WorkMore.

Congratulations to all of our student entrepreneurs! A complete list of results can be found here.