How we won "The Broker," stock pitch competition.
As fourth-year students, me and my teammates, Josh and Natasha, are always looking for opportunities to expand our horizons while giving back to the community. Which is why when we first heard about the St. Michael’s Young Leaders’ annual stock pitch competition, “The Broker,” it felt like the perfect opportunity for us.
The Broker is a stock pitch competition that requires teams to pick one of twelve healthcare-related stocks and pitch it to a panel of industry professionals from financial institutions such as, CPP and RBC. We began the process by doing high-level research on all the possible stocks to decide which was the best to pitch. Using our knowledge of the company's financial performance, outlook, and strategy, we decided to pitch Danaher. Danaher is a multi-national healthcare conglomerate that operates in the health sciences, life sciences, and environmental industries. It had a robust merger and acquisition (M&A) model and stellar financial performance which inspired us to choose it for our pitch.
During the first stage, we were required to make a one-page memo of the stock. This process was fascinating because it required us to critically think about which information was most valuable to include, as we had to be concise. It allowed us to get to the heart of the stock’s value and taught us a lot about the importance of substance in presentations. We submitted our memo and anxiously awaited to hear who would be moving on to the next round.
About a week later, we received notice that we would be proceeding to the next round. This meant it was “grind time”; we had three days to create a slide deck regarding our stock to present to the professionals at the CPP office in downtown Toronto. After consulting our mentor, an equity analyst at RBC Capital Markets, we put together a clean slide deck that was widely praised amongst his team at RBC.
Finally, the day had arrived – pitch day! We were both excited and nervous as we took the train to Union Station and spent the entirety of the journey practicing our pitch. Once we arrived, we were given a board room to practice in before it was time to present! The presentation went smoothly, and the Q&A was tough, but we fought through it. About a half hour following our pitch, the results were announced. Hearing that our team, the Bay Street Bosses, won the pitch was surreal. Afterwards, we headed to a neighbouring hotel for drinks and networking and had a fantastic time during the entire process. Overall, I would definitely participate in another stock pitch and would love to work with Josh and Natasha again!