The CFA Institute Research Challenge is an equity research competition among student teams from the world’s top university business and finance programs. Students write an equity research report on a publicly-traded company and present their findings to an expert panel. The teams are judged and a winner selected based on their written reports and presentations.  Throughout the competition, leading investment professionals volunteer as mentors and judges, and teach the students the best practices in equity research and corporate analysis.  Learn more about the Research Challenge.

Since 2009, CFA Society Switzerland hosts the local competition of the CFA Institute Research Challenge in conjunction with participating universities. The universities assemble teams of 3-5 business and finance students who work directly with a subject company selected for the Research Challenge to research and prepare their analysis. The team’s reports and final presentations are evaluated by a high profile panel of judges (composed of heads of research, portfolio managers and chief investment officers from Switzerland’s leading financial firms).

Swiss local champion advances to EMEA Regional Final. The regional and global competitions are hosted by CFA Institute in the Americas; Asia Pacific; and Europe, Middle East, and Africa regions. The winning teams from each regional competition advance to the Global Final, where one team emerges as the global champion of the CFA Institute Research Challenge.

In the last couple of years, Swiss teams were particularly sucessful in the EMEA Regional and Global Finals. In 2018 University of Lausanne was named the Global Champion and in 2019 and 2020 they won EMEA Regional Championships. 

The founders of the CFA Institute Research Challenge in Switzerland are Florian Esterer, CFA and Olivier P. Müller, CFA.