Forget Harvard, Wall Street’s Whiz Kids Come From Baruch

CUNY undergrads have been beating out Ivy Leaguers in simulated competitions.

May 10, 2017 11:06 am
The Future of Wall Street Will Come From Baruch College (Seriously)
A scene from the Rotman International Trading Competition in 2014 (FSA ULaval/Flickr)

Look out Ivy Leaguers: City college grads might be in line for that Wall Street job you supposedly had wrapped up.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the dominant team at many trading competitions was from Baruch College, a school that’s part of the City University of New York.

The competitions, which pit undergrads against their counterparts from different colleges and universities, create timed scenarios, in which students have to hit profit levels based on simulated stock, commodity, and other types of trading. As the Journal notes, the Baruch Traders Club grabbed the top three slots at an MIT trading competition last fall and ranked first at February’s Rotman International Trading Competition.

What makes the results even more impressive is that most of the students have zero experience interning at financial services companies.

“In theory, you think Baruch College students have some kind of inferiority complex regarding Harvard. We don’t. Here, you don’t have to convince the students that (the trading club) is something they want to do,” Dan Stefanica, a Baruch College professor who helped coach the Traders Club, told the Journal.

Below, take a look at Baruch’s on-campus Trading Center facility.

 

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