Purdue University students' hedge fund is gathering assets

Matthew P. Garofalo

Five Purdue University students launched their own hedge fund in November 2015, and have already reached investment interest "in the low eight-figure range."

It all started in March 2014, when Paul Griggs, a sophomore studying economics and finance at Purdue University's Krannert School of Management decided to take the plunge into the real world of portfolio management. His main ambition at the time was to create a student-run, private investment fund similar to those established at Wharton and Harvard, where he and a team of similarly driven individuals could manage their own portfolio. Along came Matt Garofalo, another finance student, to whom he pitched his idea in a Starbucks near the university. They filed the paperwork to officially form Oracle Capital with a few other classmates, one of whom being Connor Knowlton, also a finance student. During the summer of 2015, Griggs brought in Stephen Toyra, a graduate student on the Purdue basketball team with his own real estate firm, and Knowlton brought in Matt Garatoni, a sophomore studying management and entrepreneurship. The group of five met weekly, and in November 2015, founded Gold Sail Capital LLC, registered in the state of Indiana. Three of them have graduated since; Knowlton who will graduate next year and Garatoni who will graduate in 2018.

"Many have asked how we manage this hurdle," Matt Garofalo tells Opalesque. "The answer is simply that we coordinate our schedules with extraordinary precision. In between their coursework, both Connor Knowlton and Matthew Garatoni dedicate full work days to the firm even if that requires working early in the morning or late at night to accomplish objectives for the company. When you're starting up a company and are ......................

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This article was published in Opalesque's New Managers a top-down monthly analysis, news and research publication on the global emerging manager space.