Finance professionals from all over the country had an opportunity to experience the dynamism of the capital markets by participating in the recently concluded FinceX fair at the Management Development Institute in Gurgaon.FinceX, the unique portfolio investment game, organised by the students of the post-graduate programme in management course at MDI drew responses from more than 900 participants from over 100 business schools and engineering institutes across the country.
The event provided an opportunity to the budding fund managers of tomorrow to experience the intricacies of the financial markets. Participants started with a fictitious portfolio of Rs 1 crore and invested in stocks, currencies, bullion, commodities and select scrips. The objective was to maximise the portfolio's value at the end of a three month period. As it was based on the actual prices quoted in the stock markets, it put to test the investors' abilities to predict and react to real life market swings.
Defying the sentiments of the capital markets, some participants notched an incredible 80 per cent annualised return on their portfolios. The winner was Puneet Garg from the College of Business Studies, Delhi, while G Sreelatha from Bharthidasan Institute of Management, Trichy, was the runner up.
The event was sponsored by a business magazine, ANZ Grindlays, Master Trust Ltd and the All India Management Association. The winner got a cash prize of Rs 7,500 while the runner-up bagged Rs 4,500. As the event was spread over three months, 25 top performers in each month were given a free one-year subscription of Business World.
The event was unique in many ways as it offered the budding management whizkids an opportunity to test their mettle against the best in the country.
Says Geetu Agarwala, a first year finance management student at MDI and secretary of FinceX '98, ``For the beginners it was a fun-filled learning experience, giving them a flavour of the capital market syndrome. In future we plan to organise many more such events, to enable a better understanding of the fundamentals.''
Interestingly, MDI also received applications from stock brokers to participate in the event. But this year the competition was restricted only to the students. The tremendous response that FinceX evoked has prompted the organisers to make it an annual event at MDI. The next FinceX will be open to all and students will get an opportunity to test their portfolio management skills against experts in the industry.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
