Should long-term asset managers pursue riskier strategies in the hope of increasing returns?
How can we adapt our investment strategies to consciously create positive societal impact and continuously reduce negative societal impact?
How to manage the transition from traditional to sustainable investments?
Can we find innovative portfolio solutions that are both profitable and have a positive social impact?
Prospective Students
MIPC 2024 Grand Challenge: Liquidity in Retirement Saving
Information & Format FAQ
Upon registration, you will be prompted to select one of the two tracks (either in-person or virtual), which is a commitment till the end of the competition.
For access to the competition itself and the additional educational, social, and recruiting benefits we offer, teams only pay a CA$150 + tax registration fee if registering before our early bird deadline of June 30th, or CA$300 + tax if registering by our standard deadline of September 15th.
We’re also happy to announce that due to unprecedented support from our sponsors, teams that qualify for the in-person semi-finals and all other teams that wish to attend will no longer be required to pay an additional attendance fee!
The MIPC is designing a program that aims to establish rapport between sponsors and participants. Teams that choose to come to Montreal will have the unique chance to network with sponsors and recruiters from asset managers to industry experts with offices all over the world. Exclusive events will include networking cocktails as well as a post-final ceremony dinner.
In-person participants are also invited to attend the yearly symposium in-person, where a panel of C-Suite and high-profile executives engage the broader McGill and international community on how finance can benefit society as a whole, through the lens of institutional investors and practitioners.
Instead of solely hosting recruiting and networking events on the finals weekend, the MIPC organizes opportunities over the course of the challenge. This is not only for accessibility reasons, but also to give non-semi-finalist teams some of these opportunities as well. These include a mix of traditional recruiting events and personal networking sessions. Participants have a chance to indicate their recruiting preferences to receive a better match with sponsors.
With the MIPC in a hybrid format, we have stretched out events over the whole challenge. This carefully designed virtual format allows us to schedule events at a time of day that caters to teams in various time zones. This also allows teams who do not make it to the semi-final round to experience many of the educational and recruiting benefits that we offer. We will record most events, where possible, for those who need to view them at their own preferred time.
We are able to issue refunds to any registrants up until our registration closes. Once the case for the year is released, we can no longer offer a refund to teams. Thank you for understanding.
Teams that qualify to the finals will have the chance to present their proposals to a whole new panel of judges that were not involved in either track during the semi-finals. The venue will be fully equipped to logistically and technologically accommodate both in-person and virtual teams.
Building Your Team FAQ
This competition is open to students in Undergraduate, Masters, and PhD programs. A specific major is not required. Any university student who has a demonstrated interest in long-term investing is encouraged to compete in the MIPC. Every student on a team must be enrolled in an academic program as of, or after July 31st. Those graduating before this date are unfortunately not eligible as we can’t process potential winning prizes if you are not registered at a university. All students must be enrolled in either a full-time or part-time program in which they will receive a formal degree from an accredited institution.
McGill students are not eligible to compete in the MIPC.
No, the MIPC case is written such that any university student who demonstrates an interest in investments and complex societal issues could register. You can form a team with people bringing in complementary skills and knowledge about societal perspectives, buy side of finance, portfolio construction, etc. In fact, we believe that due to the multi-faceted nature of the case, the best teams should include a diverse/interdisciplinary mix of skillsets.
Historically, winning MIPC teams have a set of very diverse skills. Typically, they are not all strictly finance students; each member brings a different area of knowledge. Additionally, an academic advisor is strongly encouraged to help guide the team.
Here are some suggestions on how to build a diverse team:
- Get in touch with bachelors, masters, and doctorate level students and contact interested students from programs outside of your own. This includes, but is not limited to, business programs, science programs, and social science and humanities programs.
- Make sure that each team has a complementary set of skillsets, including quantitative portfolio modelling, economics thinking, writing, public speaking, and stakeholder analysis.
- Consider perspectives from various socio-economic segments, genders, ethnicities, religions, sexual orientations, and other historically marginalized groups.
Teams can be composed of up to 4 students. Note, the final composition of your team is not required at the time of registration. However, for our early-bird registrants, deciding your team composition as early as possible will allow you to take full advantage of our summer recruiting events.
You do not need 4 students to be successful in the competition, in fact, a team of 1 has won the competition.
Yes, however a team may only officially register and represent one university. The registered university will be announced as a winner if the team wins any prizes. All other rules still apply.
Yes, there is no limit to the number of teams from a single university. Multiple teams can also share the same advisor.
Our selection process involves a blind reviewing of reports, in the interest of fairness — meaning that reviewers will not know which school each report comes from. Thus, it is possible, though the competition is fierce, that any number of teams from your university could be selected for the final round, because the university is not a factor in the selection process.
The MIPC team highly recommends you find an academic advisor from your university. In past years, the top teams have had advisors. Advisors are meant to serve an advisory role –– that is, they are not supposed to solve the case for the students, but rather be a guide to help along the way. They can help provide possible resources for participants or to facilitate brainstorming.
In October, semi-finalist teams will be randomly matched with a mentor from one of our sponsors. Each mentor will receive training to ensure an equal experience across all teams, and we have intentionally capped the amount of time that a mentor can offer help. As with teams’ advisors, mentors are there to provide independent feedback and guidance to students. Students are ultimately responsible for producing and revising their proposals.
Yes, both semi-finalist and finalist teams will be able to receive feedback after their presentations.