Ilitch School announces winners of fall 2022 SMIF Stock Pitch Competition

Teams of finance students from the Mike Ilitch School of Business competed for the coveted Kresge Foundation Investment Award at the school's fall 2022 Student-Managed Investment Fund (SMIF) Stock Pitch Competition. This semester's competition was conducted in person on Monday, Dec. 12.

The team of Jalen Lewis and Aakash Patel took top honors for their winning presentation of John Deere to the SMIF Advisory Board.

The competition was the culmination of a finance course designed to teach students the essentials of portfolio management, equity asset valuation and selection, and how to give a real-world financial presentation. The course (FIN 5220 and FIN 7990) was created in 2015 with seed funding from Fifth Third Bank and complements a $2 million student-managed investment fund that was established by Kresge's Investment Office in 2018. The fund grew to over $3 million, and following a rebalancing at Kresge, has a current market value of $2 million.

The event was hosted by course instructor Julie Hollinshead and attended by members of the SMIF Advisory Board, additional Kresge Foundation staff and Ilitch School alumni.