The McDonough School of Business (MSB) hosted its second annual undergraduate stock pitch competition Feb. 23.

At the competition, hosted by the MSB’s Psaros Center for Financial Markets and Policy, a research center that focuses on the intersection of global finance and policy, students pitched a long-term stock buy for a company of their choosing to a panel of industry professionals and received feedback. Hailey Walker (MSB ’26), Tyler Lee (MSB ’26), Gabriel Huang (MSB ’26) and Megan Ohlinger (MSB ’24) won the competition — and $2,500 in prize money — pitching a stock buy of cybersecurity company Fortinet to the panel of judges, comprised of three investment management executives who graduated from Georgetown University.

Lee Pinkowitz, associate director of student engagement for the Psaros Center and the event’s moderator, said students had the opportunity this year to benefit and learn from the judges’ expertise and feedback.

“By practicing stock pitches, not only do students benefit financially from participating in the Psaros Center competition, but all participants have a chance to practice in front of leading practitioners,” Pinkowitz wrote to The Hoya. “This year, the judges are all Hoyas who know exactly what it is like to be in the student’s shoes — which allows them to provide guidance and constructive feedback.”

Walker said Fortinet’s business model and the recent growth in the cybersecurity industry were major factors in her team’s choice to pitch the company.

“We felt a lot of conviction in the growth of cybersecurity space since we pitched a cybersecurity company,” Walker told The Hoya. “We also thought that the company’s business model is best positioned to really capitalize on the tailwinds in that industry.” 

“I feel like we had strong reasonings for our company and we ran a pretty thorough model in terms of valuation and were able to really portray that to the judges who are really looking for that attention to detail in both the model and the pitch,” Walker added. 

Walker said her group ran into a series of challenges throughout the pitch process, particularly in consolidating all the information they wanted to include in the stock pitch within the allocated eight-minute time limit.

“Being able to summarize the company and our drivers for growth when they’re so nuanced in such a short amount of time was something that we had to think deeply about in terms of, ‘What are the most important things to say as we present this stock?’ Walker said. “We don’t have a ton of time to do it. We want to do it effectively, but we also have to be efficient in terms of the points that we’re making.” 

James Oh (MSB ’26), who pitched a stock buy at the competition for UFP Technologies, a medical technology and advanced components company, said he learned many valuable lessons from the real-world experience of pitching a stock and receiving feedback from professionals.

“It was my first pitch competition, so I learned a lot about how to pitch a stock, formatting of the pitch deck, conducting research for the stock, and what to look for to create a persuasive story,” Oh wrote to The Hoya. “My group didn’t win, but the experience I gained was even more important.”

Luke Musser (MSB ’26), part of the team pitching the Boston Scientific Corporation (BSX), a biotechnology engineering firm, alongside Anyra Kapoor (MSB ’26) and Dom Bahr (MSB ’26), said the competition offered a unique opportunity to learn from professionals in real time.

“The Psaros Pitch Competition offered an amazing opportunity to receive high quality feedback from professionals in the field of finance,” Musser wrote to The Hoya. “Anyra, Dom, and I are very grateful for the organizers’ and judges’ commitment to creating this valuable experience.” 

Walker said she appreciated the opportunity to learn from like-minded students and finance professionals. 

“It was great to bring together students who all have this passion for finance and enable us to share it with each other but also get that access to professionals in the space,” Walker said. “It’s not necessarily something that we get to do on the every day.”