Accounting Area Page

The Montano Student Investment Fund provides experiential learning for student leaders

Greg Johnson — Thu, 21 Mar 2024 20:28:24 +0000

The Montano Student Investment Fund provides experiential learning for student leaders Greg Johnson Thu, 03/21/2024 - 16:28

Co-founded in 2018 by Trevor Montano, BS Accounting ’00, and Derek Horstmeyer, a professor of finance at the Costello College of Business at ��AV, the Montano Student Investment Fund (SMIF) is an all-equity investment fund administered by finance students at the Costello College of Business.

Montano Student Investment Fund Officers

Under the supervision of ��AV’s Endowment and Board of Trustees, students working on the fund engage in incredible experiences, like building the portfolio, presenting pitches to a committee, and expanding their overall financial expertise in an academic setting. Participants must first complete Finance 477, the student management investment fund course for students to practice pitching stock.

Students selected as officers have the responsibility of managing Mason’s endowment for their respective terms. “The student officers of the Montano SMIF have a huge amount of responsibility and they all take it seriously,” says Horstmeyer. “In addition to managing a segment of the GMU endowment, they help lead Costello Fellows on Wall Street, compete in a nationwide SMIF competition in Chicago each year, and run the Alpha Challenge.”

It was during the Finance 477 course that Christopher Lindholm discovered his passion. “I had been coming to school for marketing, but finance really scratched that itch,” he says. Lindholm became so interested in the subject matter that he was eager to get involved and is currently the president of the investment committee on the SMIF. In order to be an officer for the fund, students must apply and interview with Derek Horstmeyer. “The main thing that made me want to apply for this officer position was Dr. Horstmeyer, like the way he teaches and how he’s so invested in it,” says Clarita Orosco, vice president of the risk committee. “It made me excited to learn more.”

The SMIF has attracted the attention of some of the business school’s most ambitious finance students. “I thought this was a great way for me to get involved on campus, pursue my own interests, and learn more by talking to other finance students and hearing their ideas and different perspectives,” says Sriprajna Medicherla, president of the operations and finance committee. “In finance it’s all about perspective and figuring out what the best decision is given the information.” Medicherla and a few of her teammates got to hear even more perspectives when they went to Chicago for a competition with about fifty other student managed investment fund groups from other universities. “Meeting other SMIF officers from different universities was really interesting and so was hearing their ideas about what they implemented in the fund,” she says.

It is not required to be a finance concentration or even a business major to take part in the SMIF. Gabriel Curtis, president of the risk committee, who is majoring in computer science and minoring in finance, had been exploring ways in which he could make an impact in areas besides computer science. “In finance there’s a lot of opportunities to be a generalist, and that’s honestly what I care about a lot more,” he says.

Every year, the SMIF’s officers present the annual report to the Board of Trustees, showing what was in the portfolio and how everything performed. “You get real world experience with them that you probably wouldn’t find in a typical finance course,” says Lindholm. The ability to manage a real investment fund while receiving active feedback in a classroom setting is an experience that benefits all of the participants, regardless of their career ambitions. “I would say I was able to be more informed,” says Curtis. “I’ve gotten to talk to people who graduated and work in investment banking. That’s where I’m headed now because of the fund.” Orosco adds, “I didn’t realize how many opportunities there were and how many news things Dr. Horstmeyer wanted us to explore.”

The networking, knowledge, and confidence that these students have acquired through working on the Montano Student Investment Fund have given them the immersive student experience promised at the Costello College of Business. “This much responsibility shows through on their resumes – past officers of the SMIF have gone on to work at Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, and private equity shops in New York City, Chicago, and Austin,” says Horstmeyer. Not only are the student leaders prepared for their careers but they are actively being recruited by employers.

Topics

Costello College of Business News

Accounting Area Page

Costello College of Business Students

��AV Foundation

Student Managed Investment Fund

Students

Alumni

Learn more about the Montano Student Investment Fund

Give to the Montano Student Investment Fund

In This Story

Derek Horstmeyer

Han Stice

Marianne Klinker — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 14:21:09 +0000

Han Stice Marianne Klinker Wed, 08/23/2023 - 10:21

Assistant Professor, Accounting

Contact Information

Email: jstice@gmu.edu

Biography

Han Stice joins ��AV after spending seven years at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in accounting from Brigham Young University, and his PhD in accounting from the University of Florida. His research is primarily in accounting and focuses on information use and transfer by and among market participants. In addition to his research in accounting, he is also interested in both finance and behavioral economics. He has published in a wide array of journals including the Journal of Accounting Research, Contemporary Accounting Research, Review of Accounting Studies, Journal of Corporate Finance, and Journal of Media Economics. He has experience teaching financial and managerial accounting, as well as auditing and financial statement analysis. Han comes from a family of accountants and has collaborated with various members of his family on a wide array of accounting projects. In his free time, he enjoys playing games and traveling with his wife Amber, and their four children.

Education

PhD - University of Florida
BSA and MSA - Brigham Young University

Yi Cao

Marianne Klinker — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 14:12:07 +0000

Yi Cao Marianne Klinker Wed, 08/23/2023 - 10:12

Assistant Professor, Accounting

Contact Information

Email: ycao25@gmu.edu

Biography

Before joining Mason, Yi Cao worked at the School of Management and Economics of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen as an assistant professor of accounting. He obtained his PhD in accounting from the University of Maryland, R.H. Smith School of Business. Prior to entering the PhD program, he worked at Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and other financial institutions in the United States. He has a broad range of research interests that relate to corporate voluntary disclosure channels, the interaction of labor economics and financial reporting quality, and capital market study using novel tools such as LLM and other machine learning and textual analysis techniques. Yi’s research interests include corporate voluntary disclosure, product market competition, financial disclosure quality, and textual analysis, and has been published in Contemporary Accounting Research.

Research Interests

Corporate voluntary disclosure
Product market competition
Financial disclosure quality
Textual analysis

Education

PhD - University of Maryland, R.H. Smith School of Business

Media Clippings

December 21, 2023 - AAC&U.org Academic Minute Podcast
Yi Cao, ��AV – A.I. and Earnings Calls
September 13, 2023 - Financial Times
ChatGPT should do your earnings calls
September 7, 2023 - Bloomberg
Don’t Let a Robot Do the Earnings Call

Steve Maex

Marianne Klinker — Tue, 26 Jul 2022 14:53:32 +0000

Steve Maex Marianne Klinker Tue, 07/26/2022 - 10:53

Assistant Professor, Accounting

Contact Information

Email: smaex@gmu.edu
Office Location: Enterprise Hall 112
Office Hours: By appointment

Personal Websites

StevenMaex.com

Biography

Steve Maex is an assistant professor of accounting in the Costello College of Business at ��AV. He joins Mason after obtaining his PhD from Temple University’s Fox School of Business. Prior to entering the PhD program at Temple, he spent seven years as an IT Auditor and Data Analytics Specialist at KPMG LLP. He is a Certified Public Accountant and a Certified Information Systems Auditor and strives to bring his experience as a practitioner to both his teaching and research. Among a broad set of research interests related to auditing and financial reporting quality, he particularly enjoys studying the implications of emerging trends in information management (e.g., cloud services, adherence to privacy regulations) for firms and their auditors. His work has been published in Accounting Horizons and is under review at other reputable journals. In his free time, Steve enjoys golfing and traveling with his wife.

Research Interests

Auditing
Accounting Information Systems
Emerging Technologies
Information Governance and Management

Education

PhD - Accounting, Temple University
BBA - Accounting and Information Systems, Loyola University Maryland

Research and Awards

Outstanding International Accounting Dissertation, American Accounting Association, 2023
The Audit Implications of Cloud Computing" (coauthored with Rajiv Banker, Wenyun Shi, and Xiaorong Li) Accounting Horizons, 2020

David Koo

Marianne Klinker — Thu, 19 Aug 2021 19:19:53 +0000

David Koo Marianne Klinker Thu, 08/19/2021 - 15:19

Assistant Professor, Accounting

Contact Information

Email: skoo6@gmu.edu
Office Location: Enterprise Hall 110
Office Hours: Monday 10:30 - 11:45 a.m.; Tuesday 3:00 - 4:15 p.m.

Biography

Dr. David Koo is an assistant professor of accounting in the Costello College of Business at ��AV. Prior to joining Mason in Fall 2021, he was a faculty member at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Prior to his academic career, Dr. Koo worked as an accounting and financial professional at Korea Deposit Insurance Corporation, Korea Army Finance & Accounting Corps, and PricewaterhouseCoopers. His teaching expertise includes managerial and financial accounting, and data analytics. He currently teaches Intermediate Accounting and Cost/Managerial Accounting courses. Past courses include Accounting Control Systems and Data Analytics in Management Accounting.

Research Interests

Interaction between Managerial Accounting and Financial Reporting/Disclosure
Economic Effects of Corporate Reporting and Disclosure
Information Transfer of Financial and Accounting Information

Research and Awards

Does more frequent financial reporting bring the future forward? (coauthored with J. D’Adduzio, S. Ramalingegowda and Y. Yu), Accounting Horizons, Forthcoming.
“Do Career Concerns Affect the Delay of Bad News Disclosure?” (coauthored with S. Baginski, J. Campbell, and L. Hinson), The Accounting Review, 2018.
“Influential Chief Marketing Officers and Management Revenue Forecasts” (coauthored with D. Lee), The Accounting Review, 2018.
“The Effect of Financial Reporting Quality on Corporate Dividend Policy” (coauthored with S. Ramalingegowda and Y. Yu), Review of Accounting Studies, 2017.
“Earnings Attribution and Information Transfers” (coauthored with J. Wu, and E. Yeung), Contemporary Accounting Research, 2017.

Media Clippings

May 30, 2024 - Accounting Today
Frequent financial reporting helps investors predict performance

Young Hoon Kim

Marianne Klinker — Thu, 05 Aug 2021 20:38:39 +0000

Young Hoon Kim Marianne Klinker Thu, 08/05/2021 - 16:38

Assistant Professor, Accounting

Contact Information

Email: ykim204@gmu.edu
Office Location: Enterprise Hall 237
Office Hours: By appointment

Biography

Young Kim joined the accounting faculty at Mason in 2020 after completing his PhD at Texas A&M University. He holds a bachelor's degree from Korea University and a master's degree from The University of Texas at Austin. Before coming to academics, he worked as an auditor at PricewaterhouseCoopers in South Korea and in Houston. His main research interests include global audit networks, audit regulations, and auditor demand. He currently teaches Auditing.

Research and Awards

Research:

"The demand for internal auditors following accounting and operational failures" (coauthored with Matt Ege and Dechun Wang) The Accounting Review, 2023.
“Do PCAOB inspections of foreign auditors improve global financial reporting comparability?” (coauthored with Matt Ege and Dechun Wang) Contemporary Accounting Research, 2021.
"Do global audit firm networks apply consistent audit methodologies across jurisdictions: Evidence from financial reporting comparability" (coauthored with Matt Ege and Dechun Wang) The Accounting Review, 2020.

Awards:

Outstanding Professor in Major 2022-2023
Outstanding Professor in Major 2021-2022

Media Clippings

May 31, 2023 - richardchambers.com
New Research: Companies Appreciate Internal Audit More After They Get in Trouble
May 23, 2023 - Accounting Today
Companies seek internal auditors when they get in trouble

View CV

Ted (Fikret) Polat

Marianne Klinker — Thu, 05 Aug 2021 20:18:24 +0000

Ted (Fikret) Polat Marianne Klinker Thu, 08/05/2021 - 16:18

Assistant Professor, Accounting

Contact Information

Email: mpolat@gmu.edu
Phone: (703) 993-1813
Office Location: Enterprise Hall 139
Office Hours: By appointment

Biography

Ted F. Polat received his PhD in Accounting from the University of Maryland in 2020 and joined George Mason in January 2020. He also holds masters degrees in Accounting and Economics from the University of Missouri - Columbia, and a bachelors in Computer Engineering from Bogazici University in Istanbul, Turkey. His research interests are in financial accounting and the impact of technology in the accounting domain. His professional experience includes developing accounting and financial software to a major bank. He currently teaches Accounting Analytics.

R. William Snyder

Marianne Klinker — Mon, 02 Aug 2021 21:14:50 +0000

R. William Snyder Marianne Klinker Mon, 08/02/2021 - 17:14

Assistant Professor, Accounting

Contact Information

Email: rsnyder9@gmu.edu
Phone: (703) 993-9224
Office Location: Enterprise Hall 223
Office Hours: By appointment

Biography

R. William Snyder is an assistant professor within the Accounting Area in the Costello College of Business at ��AV.

Research Interests

Corporate Taxation

Kevin S. Matthews

Marianne Klinker — Mon, 02 Aug 2021 21:03:39 +0000

Kevin S. Matthews Marianne Klinker Mon, 08/02/2021 - 17:03

Instructional Assistant Professor

Contact Information

Email: kmatth3@gmu.edu
Office Location: Enterprise Hall
Office Hours: By appointment

Biography

Kevin Matthews is an instructional assistant professor in the Accounting Area within the Costello College of Business at ��AV.

Research Interests

sensemkaing
ethics
ethical decision-making
epistemology
taxation

Education

Ed.D. Human and Organizational Learning, George Washington University
MST Taxation, American University
MAcc Accountancy, Concentration Public Accounting, Gonzaga University
MBA, Concentration Management Information Systems, Gonzaga University

Media Clippings

March 28, 2023 - Accounting Today
Get ready for a major new business filing requirement
May 11, 2023 - LawFirm.com
Bankruptcy Guide
January 26, 2023 - The Street
Leverage These Tax Breaks Before April 15
January 23, 2023 - Accounting Today
IRS opens 2023 tax filing season
August 15, 2022 - Accounting Today
Corporations facing new book tax and stock buyback levy
August 12, 2022 - Accounting Today
Lawmakers trade accusations over IRS hiring of auditors
December 17, 2021 - Business Insider
Excise Taxes: The Tax Levied on Certain Goods, Services, and Activities
October 7, 2021 — MoneyGeek
Expert Insights: Online Software vs. Accountant
August 17, 2021 — Accountancy Age
Report: Next Steps Critical for “Complex” International Tax Framework, Market Warns
May 27, 2021 - Bankrate
Estate Taxes: Will the Step Up in Basis be Eliminated? Here’s What to Know and How to Prepare
April 9, 2021 - Forbes
How To File A Tax Extension With The IRS
March 26, 2021 - Forbes
Making Health Insurance Cheaper For Millions Of Americans: President Biden’s Affordable Care Act Reforms

Colin Koutney

Marianne Klinker — Mon, 02 Aug 2021 20:58:17 +0000

Colin Koutney Marianne Klinker Mon, 08/02/2021 - 16:58

Assistant Professor, Accounting

Contact Information

Email: ckoutney@gmu.edu
Phone: (703) 993-5088
Office Location: Main Street 219
Office Hours: By appointment

Biography

Colin Koutney is an assistant professor within the Accounting Area in the Costello College of Business at ��AV.

Research Interests

Accounting for income taxes

Education

University of Texas at Austin