As the 2023-2024 school year begins, The Williston Student-Managed Investment Fund (WSMIF) hopes to build upon the success of its inaguaral year.
Founded in 2022 by Zach Pincus and Austin Conroy, the Williston Student-Managed Investment Fund actively manages $50,000 of Williston’s endowment. The WSMIF was created to give students hands-on experience managing capital, and is the largest of its kind in New England. Peer schools including Brooks and Deerfield have similar student investment funds.
Williston’s total endowment is estimated at $50 million, Peter Holden, Williston’s CFO, told The Willistonian.
The investment fund is made up of five sector groups: healthcare, media, tech/finance, consumer, and energy. Each sector group has a Managing Director, traditionally a junior or senior. They manage two to three analysts, who have been promoted up from the Investment Club. The sector groups spend a trimester doing diligent research on a company, and ultimately present their recommendation to the whole fund, along with visiting alumni, at pitch events at the conclusion of each trimester.
As of Sept. 2023, the WSMIF is currently invested in Apple, Disney, Visa, and VOO, which is an S&P500 Electronically Traded Fund, also known as ETF. A sizable portion is also invested in U.S. Treasury T-bills for when funds are not actively being invested, like summer break. These holdings have yielded a profit of around $4,000.
Luke Green, a sophomore from Florence, Mass., first joined to share his passion for investing with other people.
“This is my fourth year of Investment Club,” Luke said. “I joined the club back in seventh grade so I could talk with people about their passion and interest for investing, something I hadn’t been able to do before. I learned how many different avenues there are in investing.”
[The fund began in 20022; the Investment Club has existed longer.]
Joe Zhou, a senior from Weston, Mass., enjoys the ability to get hands-on experience managing real money.
“Getting the chance to meet other people with similar interests and to gain a more diverse perspective on the market in discussions” has improved Joe’s understanding of markets, he said.
“I learned about the business models of various companies I have conducted research on, which I probably [would] never have known if I hadn’t done research on them,” he added. “I have gained a much deeper understanding of a couple of other companies from watching the presentations of other groups.”
Logan Cherewatti, a senior from, Sunderland, Mass., first learned how to invest from the Investment Club, and has worked his way up to be a Managing Director in the fund.
“I have been in the Investment Club for all four years at Williston, but only got active in it last year, when the investment fund was created,” he said. “I joined the club because I knew I had an interest in business, and this was the closest club that matches that. I learned the basics of the stock market, but the main thing I learned is how to navigate the market and examine what to look for in a stock, and then make an educated decision.”