Fund Management

The Cougar Investment Fund portfolio is managed by four teams of student portfolio managers, each team managing a specific style of equities within the fund. The four styles of stock are divided first according to the market capitalization of their respective firms and secondly according to style, i.e. growth or value. There are, therefore, the:

• Small/Mid Cap Growth (SMG) team
• Small/Mid Cap Value (SMV) team
• Large/Mid Cap Growth (SMG) team
• Large/Mid Cap Value (SMV) team

Equities managed by the SMG and SMV teams are of firms whose market capitalizations are between $100 million and $5 billion whereas equities managed by the LMG and LMV teams are of firms whose market capitalizations are above $5 billion. The LMG and SMG teams focus on evaluating equities displaying growth characteristics, which are therefore likely of having risks somewhat above the average risk of the benchmark. The LMV and SMV teams focus on evaluating equities displaying value characteristics, which are therefore likely of having risks somewhat below the average risk of the benchmark. 

Each stock or ADR is assigned to one of these four teams and assigned to a student manager for monitoring or for reanalysis as are new stocks under consideration for inclusion in the Fund.  Once the due diligence process is complete, each team discusses its stocks for consideration and comes to consensus as to which will be bought, sold, or held. The team's analyses and recommendations are presented to the entire class for feedback and critique. The final buy and sell decision for any stock in the Fund is made by the senior portfolio managers.