2006 Competition

FIRST – Wilfrid Laurier University's team of (l to r) Veeral Khatri, Adam Rivers, Stephen Simpson and Michael Kielty are shown receiving the $2500 prize from David McLeod of CIBC.

SECOND – Dalhousie University's team of (l to r) Travis Cramb, Kevin Buchan, Jonathan Chase Hart and Richard McCormick received the $1000 prize from Mike Blaesing, representing the Risk Management Association (Atlantic Chapter). The team members send their thanks to coach Prof. Ray Carroll.

THIRD – Saint Mary's University's "Team 2" members Joann Lawless, Nancy Althouse, Tammy Milbury and Tanya Jones won the $500 prize, which was presented by Ron Pelot of Dalhousie's Centre for Risk Management.

2nd ANNUAL DALHOUSIE UNIVERSITY
CREDIT RISK CASE COMPETITION, 2006

by Anne Calder

The second annual Credit Risk Case Competition was underway with a vengeance, at the new and environmentally-friendly Kenneth C. Rowe Management Building at Dalhousie University in Halifax on February 10 and 11, 2006.

Loyola University Chicago:
Phan Nguyen, Jeremy Fischer, Siddharth Aggarwal.
(Coach: Prof. Jeannette Switzer)

The two-day event was sponsored by the RBC Centre for Risk Management in the Faculty of Management, Dalhousie University and the Risk Management Association (Atlantic Chapter), with generous support from CIBC. The mandate of the Centre for Risk Management is to introduce more risk-related projects, courses and collaborations across the university.

Friday, February 10, began with a packed schedule of speeches and panel discussions and 38 students, making up 10 teams (Dalhousie; University of New Brunswick; two from Saint Mary’s University, Halifax; two from McGill University, Montreal; one each from University of Western Ontario, London, and Wilfrid Laurier, Waterloo, Ontario; the University of Manitoba, and Loyola University, Chicago) took part in the only Credit Risk Case Competition of its kind in Canada.

University of Manitoba:
Andrew Holtmann, Amanda Grant, David Wiens, Michael Rosenby, Ryan ffrench

There seemed to be general agreement that Friday’s highlight was the banquet at the Prince George Hotel. At each table were seated four students from different schools and four guests from sponsoring companies or organizations. Several students noted the invaluable opportunity to network with guests from major financial institutions and other organizations throughout the evening.

The keynote speaker Friday evening was Stephen Plummer, BSc, MBA, President and COO of I.M.P. Group International, Inc., who spoke about his multi-year experiences doing business in Russia.

Greg MacDonald, of Port Hawksbury, Nova Scotia, is in the MBA program at Saint Mary’s University and agreed that an important aspect of Friday’s events was the opportunity to network and gave two thumbs up to the table arrangements. He also gave high marks to Plummer’s address, calling it ‘inspirational’.

David McLeod of CIBC, past President of RMA (Atlantic Chapter) and a motivating force behind last year’s event, echoed MacDonald’s comments. McLeod agrees the dinner was an integral part of the two-day event because of the networking possibilities. He is passionate about the competition because he believes it is imperative to combine Risk Analysis with financing. He points out that a competition of this nature exposes students to an area not seen in many MBA programs, despite the fact that it is a growth area and significant across all industries.

University of New Brunswick:
Michael Chang Kit, Yiaochun Gu, Anne Small, Glen Cleland (Coach), Vishaal Baulkaran

The real work for the competitors, judges and organizers began on Saturday. The order in which the teams presented was determined by a draw on Friday. Teams were briefed by Dr. Ron Pelot, Director of the RBC Centre for Risk Management at Dalhousie, at 30-minute intervals, and provided with laptop computers. Contestants were not allowed to bring personal equipment of any kind into the competition rooms.

The judges were David McLeod; Carl Holm, senior partner of Halifax law firm Wickwire Holm; Richard Ramey, of the Royal Bank; Margaret Hamlyn, Assistant Manager, Commercial Credit, BMO Financial Group; and David Boyd, CA, CIRP, Senior Vice President, Pricewaterhouse Coopers.

University of Western Ontario:
Yashwant Sankpal,
Everton Lewis, Andrey Alferov

The case to be analyzed was written by Dr. Rick Nason (also instrumental in organizing the 2005 competition) with support from the Centre for International Business Studies at Dalhousie. Consensus from the judges and competitors was that the case situation was timely and layered with scenarios of varying difficulty. The focus was the fictional Atlantic Bank which was asked to extend a $6 million loan to a long-term client – a family-owned automobile-parts assembly business located in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia.

Each team had three hours to analyze the case and prepare arguments and a PowerPoint presentation. Teams were allotted 15 minutes for their presentation, which was followed by a question and answer session with the judges.

Saint Mary’s Team 2 – the only all-female team in the competition – began the day at 11 a.m. and the tenth and final team finished its presentation just after 4 p.m. The variety of solutions devised by the teams was a testament to the thought, effort and individuality of the presentations.

McGill University was represented by two teams. (l to r) Team 2: Ryan Oldham, Matthew Ingrassia, Sergiy Ilyenko. Team 1: Bruno Alarcon, Sebastian Becerra, Khalil Benachour, Paolo Nalin

The judges were quick to admit they were impressed with the talent of the competitors. Carl Holm candidly stated that, given only three hours and the same scenario, he would be hard pressed to come up with the quality of the arguments he was judging. David McLeod felt that each group demonstrated excellent skill sets in presentation and communication and he was especially impressed with the depth of analysis achieved in three hours.

At the end of the day, three winners were chosen and the honours went to Wilfrid Laurier – 1st place (Veeral Khatri, Michael Kielty, Adam Rivers and Stephen Simpson); Dalhousie – 2nd place (Travis Cramb, Richard McCormick, Kevin Buchan, Jonathan Chase Hart) and Saint Mary’s Team 2 – 3rd place (Tammy Milbury, Nancy Althouse, Tanya Jones, and Joann Lawless).

Tanya Jones and Nancy Althouse, students in the accelerated MBA program at Saint Mary’s University, were thrilled with their placement and Althouse succinctly summed up the reality behind the competition: “We’re in it together. If a company survives, it works for us, but if the company goes down, so do we.”

Saint Mary's University
Team 1:
Greg MacDonald, Chris MacDonald, Jennifer Chang, Marjorie Griswold

Contestants’ prizes were donated by CIBC (First Prize, $2500); the Atlantic Chapter of the Risk Management Association (Second Prize, $1000) and the RBC Centre for Risk Management, Dalhousie University (Third Prize, $500).

There was consensus from everyone involved that they would like to see growth in the size and format of the competition, but Ron Pelot acknowledges that costs make it difficult to involve schools from the west coast of Canada – or the United States. But, he readily agrees that increased involvement from schools on the U.S. east coast is a worthy goal. In his opinion, the distinct advantage to students attending the competition is to raise awareness of the need and interest in credit risk rapidly growing in the marketplace.

The organizing committee: Ron Pelot, RBC Centre for Risk Management; Mike Blaesing, TD Commercial Banking; Richard Ramey, RBC Royal Bank; David McLeod, CIBC; Janet Lord, Dalhousie University. Missing: Jim Musgrave, Cox Hanson; Rick Nason & Bertrum MacDonald, Dalhousie

Based upon the performances and level of interest by students during the first two years of the event, as well as the determination of financial, academic and legal professionals to continue the competition, the best is still to come.

Anne Calder is a lawyer and student in the one-year Bachelor of Journalism program at the University of King’s College, Halifax, Nova Scotia.