When Ryan Fulmer ‘07 (Canton, Ohio) arrived on campus in August 2003, the Denison University Investment Club was facing a grim outlook. With only two members, it was hanging by a thread. The economics major decided to put it back on solid ground. “We started to see participation increase a little bit last year, and then when we put up a table at the activities fair for the first time this year, we signed up about 70 students for the club.” Since then 40 have participated consistently, and about 15 consider the investment club their primary extra-curricular activity.
With a portfolio valued at more than $180,000, today’s members do not take the club lightly. Fulmer offers, “It’s a lot like taking a fifth class. We expect everyone to do their homework on the investments so that we all know what we’re doing when we decide to invest in something.” In addition, the club has welcomed to campus this year five industry experts – Joe Thomas ‘56, Michael Sison ‘92, Tom Mallon ‘78, Irv Harlamert ‘52, Tom Hoaglin ‘71 – to speak to the Denison community about investment issues.
The club’s efforts have paid off in more ways than one. In February, it won $2,000 and placed fourth out of 20 schools in the 2004 Oak Associates Investment Challenge. (Oak Associates, which is owned by Jim Oelschlager ‘64, asks each club to contribute 5 percent of its return to its school’s endowment). The Denison club’s 22.2 percent return – which beat the market average by 12 percent – put it ahead of many well-respected schools such as Northwestern Law and Wesleyan University.
The club currently owns about 15 different stocks ranging from women’s clothing stores to communications companies to fast-food chains. It also invests in lesser-known ventures such as real estate investment trusts. “This is meant to be a learning experience for us. We’re all in this to learn how to invest money wisely. We try to discuss just about every kind of equity investment there is so that we can best manage our accounts.”
The club has split its assets into two separate accounts with varying investment strategies. One, made possible by a $50,000 donation by Jim and Vanita Oelschlager, focuses on an aggressive strategy that is intended to yield high annual returns. The other account “practices the complete opposite strategy,” according to Fulmer. It consists of slow growth stocks for more reliable dividends, some of which fund the club’s operating budget.
Two years after Fulmer joined the investment club, its outlook is much more promising. “Our goals are to beat the S&P 500 by 10 percent, to place consistently in the top 5 of the Oak Competition, and to achieve an annualized return of 23.5 percent. We ought to be managing about $230,000 in two years,” Fulmer says. “We’re all making an investment in our future and that of the school. That’s what investing’s all about.”