Barney School of Business Introduces First Student Club Q? Project in Quantitative and Qualitative Research

Barney School of Business has its first-ever student-research organization, The Q² Project. This is an innovative student organization that participates in quantitative and qualitative research surrounding quantitative finance, business analytics, and other similar fields, thanks to founding members Alec Boyd ’23 (double major in finance and business analytics) and Anthony Seneseman ’23 (double major in finance and mathematics).

Recently, Q² participated in the Bloomberg 2021 Trading Challenge, where students were competing with 495 teams from around the globe, buying and selling equities to try to outperform the Bloomberg World Large-, Mid-, and Small-Cap Price Return Index (WLS). They were placed in the top 35% of teams with a total return of $65,545 (or 6.5%), outperforming the WLS by $19,484 (1.94%) over the time period. Concurrently, Anthony and the organization also participated in the CME University Trading Challenge. The Q² team outperformed 79% of teams by placing 81st out of 386, achieving a monthly net gain of over 6%. The team plans on competing again next year, but this time with a portfolio of automated trade signals to be managed algorithmically.

If you are interested in diving deeper into your learning and working with a great group of students (and building your resume) please reach out to Anthony Senseman (SENSEMAN@hartford.edu) or Alec Boyd (aboyd@hartford.edu) about joining Q².