It’s that time of the year again, when the old year’s missteps and blunders are history (and only your investors’ problem at this point), and the New Year offers all the promise in the world for aspiring fund managers to show their skills and try beat the market. So put on your thinking caps this week and show us your favorite picks by next Monday morning.
This is the thread for the 2025 hedge fund contest. The official start of the contest will begin using Monday Jan 13th closing prices, so the hard cutoff for entries is 4pm ET when the market closes next Monday. I suggest trying to make up your mind by next Monday morning and posting earlier so you don’t get busy during the day and forget. For reference, here is the previous year's contest (2024) thread.
Here are the contest guidelines, same format as in previous years.
- Pick a fancy name for your hedge fund.
- Before 4:00pm EST on 13 Jan 2025, in this thread, pick up to three stocks to go long and up to three to short. Equal dollar amounts are placed on each position, long or short. Remember this is a stock picking contest, so ETFs and other funds are not allowed. Fartcoin is right out.
- Opening prices will be based on Jan 13th close.
- No trades during the year, except that you can elect at any time to "freeze" the price for any individual position at the next market closing price, i.e. liquidate any position, by posting your request in this thread. (Each position carries this option; you can choose to freeze different positions on different days.) Other than that, you're stuck with what you choose for the year.
- If a stock is taken out in a merger or a bankruptcy during 2025, we will do our best to do the right thing. An all cash offer will result in a freeze at the takeout price. An all stock offer will result in the conversion of the position to the acquiring company's shares. For mixed cash and stock offers or other more complicated events, you'll just have to trust me to saw things off fairly.
- The universe from which to choose is the Russell 3000. Sadly, the new ownership of Russell doesn't provide their index easily, so here's the current holdings of Vanguard's Russell 3000 ETF, which we'll use as our universe:
If you want to make sure your stock is eligible, you can either search for its name or ticker in the above Russell list, or as an easier approach, use this link to Vanguard's Russell 3000 ETF's current holdings and put in the ticker or name in the search bar and make sure it comes up.
https://advisors.vanguard.com/investmen ... #portfolio
PLEASE check one of the above links for your tickers to make sure they are eligible stocks. Absent rare situations like name or ticker changes, If they aren't found in either of these files, they aren't eligible (you can ask me if you’re unsure). If you pick shares not on this list and it's not caught and corrected before the deadline, your portfolio or at least those ineligible choices will be disqualified. Dividends will not be counted.
Like last year, Tanelorn will be providing fixes and commentary as the year goes on. Once we get a spreadsheet prepared, you’ll be able to see that here:
Current Standings - 2025 hedge fund contest
Good luck!
