Every day is Monday: Inside the UF Caimanes Fund

With 6:30 a.m. trainings, Wall Street-style rigor and real capital on the line, the UF Warrington College of Business Caimanes Fund is preparing students to compete for the most selective finance roles in the world.

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At the University of Florida Warrington College of Business, a group of students start each day off like the analysts they hope to become on Wall Street. Come 6:30 am, they are reviewing earnings reports, tracking industry developments, building financial models and preparing investment pitches. 

They’re part of the Caimanes Student Managed Equity Hedge Fund, UF’s first and only student-managed equity hedge fund, and one of the only collegiate hedge funds nationwide, designed to prepare students to compete for the most selective finance roles in the world. 

“At Caimanes, we embrace the philosophy that ‘every day is Monday,’” explained Clinical Assistant Professor and fund leader Eddie Sanchez. “It’s a mindset of discipline, preparation and relentless improvement. Our analysts don’t just study the markets – they live them.”

The Caimanes Fund is part of a suite of finance experiential learning programming offered at the Warrington College of Business, which also includes the Gator Student Investment Fund and Finance Professional Development program. These programs give the thousands of undergraduate business students at the University of Florida the opportunity to put their learning into practice at the highest levels, making them even more competitive as they enter the job market. 

Developed in 2024 thanks to a gift from Point72 Founder and CEO Steven A. Cohen, the Caimanes Fund helps students build the technical foundation, discipline and analytical rigor necessary to compete for roles at the top 1% of firms. 

Take Point72 Academy, for example, Sanchez explained: they receive thousands of applications for just a few number of internship spots.

“They seek creative thinkers who can solve complex problems in unique ways, understand the markets, and build and interpret complex financial models,” he said. “They value candidates who have a disciplined process and genuine passion for their work. We’ve adopted the same model, aiming to prepare our members to secure internships and ultimately receive offers for full-time positions.”

For Olivia Siller (BSBA ‘27), joining the Caimanes Fund was the opportunity she was looking for to prepare her for her future career in equity research or at a hedge fund, with the goal of eventually running her own fund.

“I joined Caimanes because it stood out as the most rigorous opportunity on campus to gain real-world investing experience under the mentorship of a former hedge fund manager,” she said. “I wanted to push myself outside of the classroom, develop a strong analytical process and learn how to think critically about businesses, financial models and markets in a way that would prepare me for a career in high finance.”

As members of the fund, students spend their first eight weeks diving into specific training that ranges from how to access research resources to statement modeling and valuation, culminating with how to build stock pitches. 

Thanks to the training, Zachary Ducore (BSBA ‘28) developed his own unique process for researching and analyzing public companies. With a strong understanding of how to analyze 10K, 10Q and earnings calls, Ducore had his first step in the process down.

“[Next,] utilizing UF’s Bloomberg Lab, digging deeper into other news sources, and understanding macroeconomic as well as industry trends allowed me to better understand companies and create pitches for both long and short positions in the market,” he explained. “Beyond research techniques, I also learned how to build dynamic three statement models from scratch in Excel. On a day-to-day basis, I am checking news outlets for any important news about my companies in coverage, while continuing to read and build models for new companies that I plan to pitch in the future.”

The fund, organized by sectors, offers students a deeper exploration into particular industries. Marcos Ortega (BSBA ‘28), who plans to pursue his master’s in FinTech at UF, saw the technology sector as his way to stay up to date with a rapidly changing industry impacting our world today and in the future. 

“Technology was my ideal sector because it’s at the forefront of innovation and is responsible for the majority of current and future transitions in how we live,” he said. “Especially with the rise in popularity of AI through mainstream LLMs like ChatGPT, technology has become increasingly relevant.”

A necessary part in the growth of AI usage, Anotida Musiya (BS ISE ‘28) was captured by the energy industry. 

“I chose to get involved in the energy sector because I was fascinated by the scale of industry,” he said. “While energy rarely makes front page news, it is the backbone to many economies.”

Despite only being a year into its tenure, the Caimanes Fund is already helping its members get their foot in the door at prominent finance institutions. Musiya was able to use his Caimanes skills in an internship with EY Zimbabwe, DiBenedetto secured his internship with FourThought Private Wealth by speaking about his Caimanes deliverables and Ducore is planning to attend T. Row Price next summer thanks to his experience with the fund.

Siller’s Caimanes experience helped her gain both the technical skills and confidence to speak about her work in her summer internship with DSM Capital Partners. Not only was Siller the first female student to be hired as an intern, DSM Capital Partners also reported back to Sanchez that she was the best intern they had ever had.

“Joining Caimanes has been pivotal in preparing me for internships and professional opportunities,” she said. “[In my internship,] I pitched equities for their newly launched strategy and supported analyst coverage of names during earnings seasons. All this work was directly informed by my Caimanes training.”

Ortega’s experience with the fund enabled him to place 17th out of 1,400-plus undergraduates across the country in a public forecasting tournament hosted by Bridgewater Associates and Metaculus. His performance in the tournament earned him a first-round interview with Bridgewater. While he was ineligible to advance in the interviews because he was only a freshman at the time, Ortega wouldn’t have been able to get in front of the company’s team without his ‘Caimanes mindset.’ 

“Researching successful long/short pair trades is difficult and requires a level of depth that I find most of my classes lack,” he said. “[The Caimanes Fund] has helped me by establishing a pool of knowledge and analytical ability I can reference in interviews and utilizes in my other classes and intellectual pursuits. I wouldn’t have secured the opportunity in the first place without having the developed problem-solving and research mindset Caimanes has fostered.”

In the coming year, Sanchez hopes to grow the fund’s student membership and expand coverage to all 11 sectors of the S&P 500. 

“We tell students: if you want elite training, hands-on experience in a real-world investing environment, and mentorship from an experienced hedge fund manager, Caimanes is the fund for you,” he said. “We demand discipline, dedication and hard work, applying research techniques at the forefront of the investment industry.”

Having already significantly benefitted from joining the Caimanes Fund, Siller doubled-down on why students should consider being a member. 

“Students should join Caimanes if they are serious about pursuing careers in finance and want to accelerate their learning in a way no other organization at UF can offer,” she said. “It’s the only place on campus where students can go long and short equities with real capital while being trained directly by an industry professional. The community is challenging, but for students who are ambitious and curious, it’s an unmatched experience.”