By Jess Clarke
When most of his high school peers were texting with their cell phones, Zach Abramczyk, a Poole junior, was on his iPhone following stocks of his favorite companies, including Bojangles, Starbucks and Wendy’s.
“I became enthralled with the stock market and started devouring everything I could read about it,” the NC State business administration major says.
No surprise, then, that Abramczyk is the new managing director of Bell Tower Capital Management, NC State’s undergraduate-managed investment fund. He oversees a stock portfolio with holdings in Caterpillar, CVS, IBM, Target, Walmart and about 35 other companies.
“We look to invest in quality companies that generate strong cash flows, aren’t overleveraged on the balance sheet and hopefully are growing year after year,” Abramczyk says. Students use a value-oriented strategy to make long-term investments. They invest in businesses that seem to be trading for less than their predicted intrinsic value, which means there’s an opportunity to buy shares at a discounted price.
Real-World ROI
The Bell Tower fund, established in 2017, finished 2021 with $215,000 in managed assets. The fund had an overall return of about 20 percent in 2021, compared with its S&P 500 index benchmark’s 28 percent return. Bell Tower’s three-year annualized return is 16 percent, compared with the S&P’s 19 percent.
We’re a bunch of students who do this as a hobby. On face value, that’s a great return.
Abramczyk calls Bell Tower’s three-year performance satisfactory overall. “We’re a bunch of students who do this as a hobby. On face value, that’s a great return,” he says. “And in terms of absolute performance, 2021 was a solid year, and we can’t complain.”
The real value of Bell Tower goes beyond stock market returns.
“It’s always good to focus on what our true purpose is, and that’s to provide students an opportunity to learn within a fund environment,” Abramczyk says.
Applying Key Initiatives
Highlights in the fund’s 2021 annual report show that students made progress with key initiatives.
Bell Tower established a semester-long analyst development program for new members. Students learn about investment strategies, accounting basics, valuation modeling, risk assessment, and macroeconomics and markets. Students also revised their marketing strategy, aiming to recruit more women and students of color. And they incorporated certain portfolio-management principles to guide smart investing decisions.
Those initiatives reinforce the real-world opportunity Bell Tower gives students. The experience they gain has helped alumni land positions with top organizations — Bank of America, Vanguard, Wells Fargo — in asset management, investment banking, accounting and finance.
Bell Tower is always one of the most talked-about topics in any interview I’ve had…I don’t know anyone involved with Bell Tower who has struggled to find a position after graduation.
“We provide students the equivalent of an internship experience,” Abramczyk says. “Bell Tower is always one of the most talked-about topics in any interview I’ve had…I don’t know anyone involved with Bell Tower who has struggled to find a position after graduation.”
Bell Tower draws dozens of applications each year.
As the fund’s equities director Vats Mewada, a Poole junior, puts it, “Bell Tower is the convergence point of the brightest minds in finance NC State has to offer. It’s because of everyone’s intelligence and hard work that the fund has been as successful as it has been.”
With about 15 students involved, the fund is open to undergraduates in any discipline, although all current members are Poole College majors. Applicants must pass an exam — a quick stock pitch — as part of the interview structure. “I want to see their thought process, how they’d go about conducting equity research,” says Mewada, an economics major who recruits and trains students.
Skills for the Future
His ability to conduct equity research was one skill Mewada discussed in an interview for a Regions Bank internship. He and Abramczyk will have Regions summer internships. They credit their Bell Tower experience with helping them get the positions.
“To be able to go into an interview and say I’ve written an entire equity research report on a company… and that I understand valuation models is huge,” Abramczyk says.
For alumna Haleigh Ensminger, a Bell Tower member until she graduated last December, the fund comes up in job interviews and graduate school applications.
Bell Tower was one reason she chose NC State.
“I heard about it at Accepted Students Day at NC State when I was in high school and thought it sounded like an awesome opportunity,” says Ensminger, who majored in accounting and finance.
In addition to learning about finance with Bell Tower, she built skills in areas employers expect: communication, teamwork, presentation, receiving feedback in real time. She taps those talents as an intern with CPA firm Johnson Lambert. This summer, she’ll intern with professional services firm Ernst & Young before entering graduate school for a master’s in accounting.
To Ensminger, the comradery among Bell Tower members is one example of NC State’s supportive campus.
What set NC State apart in my eyes was the willingness and even eagerness of faculty, staff and other students to help you succeed.
“What set NC State apart in my eyes was the willingness and even eagerness of faculty, staff and other students to help you succeed,” she says. “NC State not only wanted to see me succeed but wanted to be a critical part of helping me succeed. While I probably could have done it on my own, I am way farther ahead because of the university’s help and guidance.”
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