Ayushman Rai ’27 Wins 16th Annual Babson Trading Competition

Ayushman Rai ’27 recently won the 16th annual Babson Trading Competition, which drew more than 40 undergraduate and graduate students from Babson and Wellesley colleges to the finance lab of the Stephen D. Cutler Center for Investments and Finance.

The Babson Trading Competition—hosted by Ryan Davies, professor of finance—pits students against one another using the Rotman Interactive Trader software, which simulates an order-driven market.

Rai led the top five finishers, including Alexander Ancede MBA’27 in second, Fatih Kalci ’28 in third, Yeonjin Ryu MSF’26 in fourth, and Roshni Galani MBA’27 in fifth. In addition to cash prizes, the top five will be invited to the Fidelity Investments trading floor in Boston for a tour and to meet and network with additional Fidelity traders.

The competition, sponsored by Fidelity, centers on the Liability Trading cases (LT3, LT4). In these cases, participants act as principal traders. Institutional orders are randomly routed to a principal trading desk, and traders must then decide whether to accept the tender. If they accept, the trader needs to develop an optimal strategy to unwind the position over time, considering market conditions such as liquidity, price volatility, and price impact.

Before the competition began, co-head trader Ken Martin ’95 joined his teammates from Fidelity’s trading floor for a discussion about what it is like to work on the trading floor and how their career paths led them to Fidelity. Martin was joined by Rebecca Kim, equity syndicate, and John Wisbach, systematic trader.