Discretionary Long/Short Equity Investing

Catalog description

This rigorous seminar-styled course teaches students how professional discretionary equity investors — long-only managers, long/short hedge funds, mutual funds, REIT/infrastructure specialists, and activist investors — assess companies, industries, management teams, business models, and strategic decisions to form actionable investment theses. Students learn to combine fundamental financial analysis, industry research, behavioral frameworks, capital allocation assessment, and strategic competitive analysis to build complete, real-world investment decisions. The course will incorporate high-value case studies from complex industries where regulation, capital intensity, strategic differentiation, and consumer behavior provide powerful generalizable insights into how discretionary investors evaluate opportunities. The course is explicitly applied: students learn by dissecting real companies, evaluating real catalysts, and presenting real investment opinions. The capstone is a professional-grade long or short investment pitch.