NEWPORT BEACH, Calif., JULY 23, 2001 (PRIMEZONE) -- Mark Matheson, with his essay "The Garden of Global Investing," has won the grand prize in PIMCO's inaugural Investing Globally Essay Contest.
The contest was announced in February by PIMCO, one of the world's most innovative fixed income managers, as a way of tapping into even more cutting-edge ideas for its global investment management effort.
"Just as we'd hoped, the contestants offered a spectrum of thoughts. Essays ranged from technical to sublime, from descriptive to prescriptive, from focused to uninhibited," said Bill Gross, PIMCO founder, Chief Investment Officer and chair of the essay-selection committee. "We advised aspiring entrants 'forget the wishy washy; forget the conventional wisdom.' We're so pleased with the results that we hope to make the contest an annual event."
Rounding out the essay-selection committee were two intellectual titans of global investing: Alberto Giovannini, former Ministry Chairman for the Italian Treasury, and Peter L. Bernstein, author of "Against the Gods." Each paper submitted was assigned a number and then blindly evaluated on five subjective criteria: originality, creativity, clarity, impact and relevance.
Matheson, 44, who will receive $5,000 for his grand prize winning essay, earned a BS in Chemical Engineering as well as a MBA from the Harvard Business School and is currently working toward his Doctor of Management in Organizational Leadership at the University of Phoenix. His essay examines the similarities between successful horticulture and the administration of an international portfolio -- both require patience and planning, and benefit from active management. The selection committee was ultimately persuaded by the simple message that his disarming essay poetically communicated.
Other winners of the essay contest were:
-- Lance Ng Yeow Min, of Nanyang Business School at the Nanyang
Technological University, Singapore -- First Place/Undergraduate
for "Investing Globally in the New Economy"
-- Dhruv Mallick, Illinois Institute of Technology -- First
Place/Masters for "Economic Liberalization and its Effect on a
Country's Stock Market"
-- Kurtay Ogunc, Watson, Wyatt & Co. -- First Place/Faculty and
Practitioners for "The Relevance of Currency Arithmetic on
Institutional Portfolios"
Min, Mallick and Ogunc will each receive $1,000 -- and just as important, may see their ideas put to work on behalf of PIMCO's clients.
With $220 billion under management, "PIMCO is uniquely positioned to put ideas to work, to have a positive impact for our clients and to serve the saving public more broadly," said John Brynjolfsson, who together with his colleague, Vineer Bhansali, organized the essay contest. "Like any human organization, we have to avoid stagnation and group-think. The essay contest is one way we can reach out globally, invite new ideas, tap outside talent, challenge ourselves intellectually, and have fun doing it."
The winning essays can be now be viewed on the PIMCO Website www.PIMCO.com. Details regarding next years contest and prizes should be posted on the site by December 31, 2001.
PIMCO, founded in 1971 and based in Newport Beach, California, is now majority owned by Munich-based Allianz Group, a leading global insurance company with nearly $670 billion in assets and represented in 70 countries around the globe.
Disclosures
Except for the historical information and discussions contained herein, statements contained in this news release constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements may involve a number of risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially, including the performance of financial markets, the investment performance of PIMCO's sponsored investment products and separately managed accounts, general economic conditions, future acquisitions, competitive conditions and government regulations, including changes in tax laws. Readers should carefully consider such factors. Further, such forward-looking statements speak only on the date at which such statements are made. PIMCO undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date of such statements.