TigerFund is an equities portfolio managed entirely by students at Hampden-Sydney College. It is an opportunity for selected students concentrating in Economics to gain valuable experience managing a live equities portfolio. TIGERFUND was started in 2002 when the Economics Department proposed the idea to College President Walter Bortz, who later agreed to allocate a portion of the College's endowment for the students' use. The activities of the Fund are supervised by one of the professors in the Economics Department on a weekly basis. Additionally, the Fund has its own Advisory Board composed of professionals from the investments field which meets each year to evaluate the Fund's status.
The student managers are entirely responsible for the investment decisions of the Fund. The Managers establish the stock selection criteria, research the prospective stocks, make the decision whether or not to invest in the stocks, and execute the trades. The Managers also play an integral part in interviewing, evaluating, and recommending the student Managers for the following year's Fund. The final activity of the TIGERFUND Managers is to compose an Annual Report and present it to the Advisory Board.
While Managers are given course credit for their service in the fund, the structure of the Fund is not that of a traditional lecture-based course. The Managers of the Fund are the drivers of the activities. The structure outlined in the TIGERFUND Operational Manual describes the procedures that Managers must follow. However, the deliberations and decisions of the Managers are left completely up to them. The Faculty Advisor will help the students if they have questions, but will not determine the outcome. For some undergraduate students, this approach can be frustrating initially. A major objective of this program is the learning that occurs as the managers struggle with the many important decisions that await them.