What You Can Win?
Cash Prizes
Competition Overview
The Youth Sustainability Investment Challenge (YSIC), hosted by the Youth Entrepreneurship and Finance Association (YEFA) and sponsored by Global Alliance, is an ESG-centered portfolio management competition. In YSIC, students will have the opportunity to think creatively, build their own unique strategies, and test out various financial instruments individually or with a team up to 4 members (Team Size: 1-4 members). Each student/team will start out with $1,000,000 in cash and have roughly 3 months to construct an ESG-oriented portfolio. Any stock and bond listed on a YSIC-approved stock exchange or bond exchange will be allowed for trading during the competition. Finalists (top 10 global students/teams) will have the opportunity to pitch their investment strategy to a panel of distinguished Wall Street judges, compete in New York City for a $5,000 cash prize pool, and attend a unique networking event in NYC with industry-leading professionals.
Sustainabilily: ESG Strategy
Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance (ESG) is an approach of assessing the extent to which a company is working on behalf of social objectives that go beyond its role to maximize profits on behalf of its shareholders. ESG analysis has become an increasingly important part of the investment process. A key motivation for investment professionals to incorporate environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues into their financial analysis is to gain a fuller understanding of the companies in which they invest.
In the Youth Sustainability Investment Challenge (YSIC™), we ask participants to incorporate ESG-related principles into their overall investment strategies & investment decisions-making processes. Participants may implement different approaches in integrating ESG analysis into their investment processes. Further ESG-related educational study materials / webinars will be provided by YEFA.
Dates & Timeline
2023 Key Dates | Event |
July 27th, 2023 | Registration Starts |
September 30th, 2023 | Registration Ends |
October 2nd, 2023 | Competition Begins |
| January 5th, 2024 | Final Report Due |
January 27th, 2024 | Top 30 semifinalists announced |
| February 24th, 2024 | Video Submission Due |
March 8th, 2024 | Top 10 finalists announced |
Trading Hours:
Here are the trading times for some of the largest global stock exchanges. (All times represent regular trading hours, Monday-Friday, and are listed in Eastern time.)
· New York Stock Exchange (NYSE): 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m
· Nasdaq Stock Market (NASDAQ): 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m
· Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX): 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.
· Mexico Stock Exchange (BMV): 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.
· London Stock Exchange (LSE): 3 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.
· Euronext Paris (EPA): 3 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.
· Frankfurt Stock Exchange (FRA): 3 a.m. to 11 a.m.
· Tokyo Stock Exchange (TSE): 8 p.m. to 10:30 p.m., 11:30 p.m. to 2 a.m.
· Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE): 9:30 p.m. to 11:30 p.m., 1 a.m. to 3 a.m.
· Shenzhen Stock Exchange (SZSE): 9:30 p.m. to 11:30 p.m., 1 a.m. to 3 a.m.
· Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKG): 9:30 p.m. to 12 a.m., 1 a.m. to 4 a.m.
Trading Rules
- Trading 10/02/2023- 12/9/2023
- Each account will start out with $1,000,000 in virtual cash.
- All Stocks must be greater than $3,
- International stocks are allowed.
- Stocks and Bonds are allowed to buy and sell.
- ETF, short selling, margin trading, Cryptocurrencies, and other options are not allowed.
- The maximum amount a student can invest in single security (either a stock or bond) is 10%. (Example: the maximum you can invest in AAPL is 10% of your entire portfolio)
- Each account must make a minimum of 1 trade by 11:59 pm EST on 10/16/2023. Otherwise, you will be disqualified.
- Your cash position cannot be greater than 50% at the midterm. Ex: if you buy 10% for each stock, the minimum number of stocks is 5.
- Record each transaction
- To enter the quarterfinals and semifinals, you need to show that at least one ESG-friendly stock in your portfolio.
- There is no brokerage fee for this competition.
- There is no interest income on cash balances
- ESG Requirements TBD
Mid Report Requirements
Each team leader should submit their finalized team roster (their students’ names and schools, and addresses). Note: there are no team composition requirements. Any country, school grade.
Each portfolio must have less than 50% of the cash. You can buy bonds/treasury (cash similar) to substitute cash investment.
Presentation Must Include:
- Team name and an introduction of each team member
- How the team met one another
- What they’ve learned so far
- Their trading strategy and your portfolio performance
- Reasoning for their ESG friendly stock
Competition Deliverables
We will be judging you primarily on the 3 deliverables you present to us.
– Students will be judged on their portfolio’s performance in the first round of YSIC™.
– The YSIC™ team will be crosschecking students’ trades with their proposed investment strategy.
– Risk Tolerance & Return Objectives
– Time Horizon
– Liquidity
– Asset Allocation
– Macro Analysis
– Individual Security Selection
– ESG Strategy
– Competition Reflection / Lessons Learned
– Strategy Overview
– Investment Case Study
– Q&A Section
More information about these deliverables as well as YSIC™’s judging criteria will be released through the duration of the competition
Disclaimer:
Any information or data related to the Youth Sustainability Investment Challenge (YSIC™) is only contest-related and does not indicate any trading/investing recommendations or profit promises in the real stock market. YEFA is not responsible for actual profit or loss in a participant’s real personal brokerage account.
ü YEFA reserves the right to modify the competition rules, awards, and any other instructions over the entire duration of the Youth Sustainability Investment Competition (YSIC™).
What can we offer?
Improve Finance Skills
Students will gain practical experience and learn financial industry knowledge in a simple way with the help of the trading simulation, periodic seminars, and study materials.
Virtual Trading Platform
Participating students will have hands-on experience of placing stock trades just like a portfolio manager on a web-based stock market simulation platform which executes all US stock trades at real time prices with real-world data.
Communication and Time Management
Throughout the 3 months, students will have a great opportunity to improve their communication and time management skills, and practice leadership and teamwork skills – the most important skills in the 21st century which have lifetime benefit.
Enhance College Applications
The YEFA Committee is committed to provide the participants with learning opportunities, and regularly invites industry professionals to share & discuss topics such as investment and finance etc. Students will gain valuable insights about college, careers, and lifetime lessons via discussions.
More Info
Email: YSIC@yefa.org
Discord:
