Logan Hoffman '19 wins Stock Pitch Competition

Thursday, November 8, 2018

The winner of this year’s annual Stock Pitch Competition is advising you to sell Tesla, and sell it quickly. 

This year marked the 5thyear of the Capital Markets and Investment Banking Symposium, a day that drew both finance professionals and students for networking, panel discussions on emerging issues in the finance industry, and a student stock pitch competition. 

This year’s Stock Pitch Competition, with a cash prize of $2,000, covered the Tesla stock, a known tricky stock to analyze and forecast. After sifting through proposals, the Financial Policy Center had chosen 3 finalists to present during the symposium: Logan Hoffman ’19, Samyak Jain ’21, and Nicolas Silberstein Camara ’21.

Hoffman, an economics and business administration finance option double major, provided the panel with a pitch to sell Tesla stock. His reasoning boiled down to the fact that if any other company were doing business in the way that Tesla does, investors would immediately sell realizing that it is an uncertain stock. 

Jain, a business administration major, pitched the buy option to the panel. Samyak exuberantly and convincingly explained to the judges that Tesla is pouring money in to the company to find the cheapest way to make the cars, and that soon they will have it figured out and the stock price will soar. 

Silberstein Camara, an engineering major, pitched the plan to swing trade. Swing trading is short-term buying and selling at high and low points. Camara felt this was the best option because of the stock’s volatility. 

Ultimately, Hoffman won the judges over with his analysis and was awarded the grand prize.