Small Cap Equities Intern

Location: Madison Wisconsin

Making a Difference

The State of Wisconsin Investment Board (SWIB), founded in 1951, is a premier global investment organization responsible for managing the more than $178 billion of assets of the fully funded Wisconsin Retirement System (WRS), the State Investment Fund and other state funds. Through SWIB’s effective and innovative investment management, WRS remains one of the only fully funded US public pensions. The WRS consistently ranks among the 10 largest public pension funds in the U.S. SWIB is recognized by the investment industry for our teamwork and innovation. SWIB pursues sophisticated global investment strategies across the asset and risk allocation spectrum. Providers across the investment ecosystem seek to partner with SWIB.

Serving more than 703,000 beneficiaries of the WRS, SWIB is a mission-driven organization focused on providing a strong financial future to those who committed their careers to public service. For public employees and the 1,607 Wisconsin employers who contribute on their behalf, we are a trusted partner. Our team innovates continuously to meet the challenges of an evolving investment landscape while growing and protecting the assets of the WRS.

SWIB provides a strong, steady economic pillar for the state of Wisconsin by growing the trust funds under its management, managing risk, and optimizing costs of the long term. We are a mission-driven organization and the participants we serve are our mission. By bringing a disciplined, prudent, and innovative approach to market opportunities, SWIB has been successful in generating required returns and maintaining the trust of the beneficiaries and stakeholders of the funds we oversee.

Home To Top Talent

Our high-performing staff is key to what makes us a premier investment manager. SWIB is committed to investing in talented professionals to implement our robust, sophisticated investment strategies and to keep the organization at the forefront of the investment industry. We encourage innovation and offer professional development opportunities to help staff sharpen and expand their skills. Approximately 61 percent of SWIB’s investment professionals are Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) charterholders.

Job Description

About the Team

The Small Cap Team currently consists of six investment professionals, each of whom follow a variety of sectors/industries.  The team collaboratively constructs a diversified portfolio benchmarked against the MSCI USA Small Cap Index under the guidance of a Lead Portfolio Manager.  The team’s investment process is focused on bottom-up stock selection targeting alpha generation over an intermediate to long-term time horizon.  Security selection balances fundamental analysis of the business model’s opportunities with its attendant risks.  The result is a portfolio consisting of reasonably valued equities of higher quality companies that tend to exhibit growth on both the top and bottom lines.

The public equities division consists of 25 professionals who actively manage approximately $13 billion for SWIB.   The division manages two portfolios – a large-cap global portfolio and a small cap domestic portfolio.   The small cap portfolio is run as a single product, while the global portfolio is run as a collection of sector “sleeves” with small teams (1-3 people) creating active portfolios for each of the 11 GICS sectors.

The portfolios are driven by stock selection processes that are grounded in a fundamental assessment of the underlying business model’s risks and opportunities overlaid with an appropriate valuation framework.   Investment professionals interact with outside analysts and experts, meet with management teams, and attend conferences as part of our analytical process.  Our portfolio construction blends these insights with an understanding of risk and alpha factor sensitivities to create portfolios that produce alpha in a consistent, risk-efficient manner over time.

Essential activities

Understand and employ an investment process to generate alpha vs. a benchmark. The process includes stock selection methodology, a factor exposure aware portfolio construction approach and risk management techniques.

Directly perform fundamental business model assessment and valuation analysis of individual securities as part of a stock selection process.

Employ relative valuation and quantitative methods to assess attractiveness of investments.  Based on this analysis, investment teams can go long or short stocks and employ options strategies as appropriate.

Monitor quarterly earnings releases of companies to evaluate existing investment views.

Interact with sell-side analysts and company management teams to form and revise investment opinions.

Generate and pitch new investment ideas for specified sectors.

Special projects as assigned.

The Ideal candidate

Ability to work in Madison, WI for an approximate 10-week period beginning late May/early June 2027.

Currently pursuing a graduate degree in Business, especially Accounting, Finance or Applied Equity Analysis.

Top academic performer who is self-motivated, has a passion for investing and thrives in unstructured environments that foster creativity, maturity and independence.

Has a solid working knowledge of the investing process including financial analysis and modeling and incorporating a valuation framework to arrive at an investment thesis.

Ability to analyze a variety of information sources, draw relevant conclusions and clearly summarize and communicate results in a time-sensitive manner.

Excellent communication skills and the ability to work in a team-oriented culture.

Experience with FactSet and/or Bloomberg.

Progress towards Chartered Financial Analyst certification.

Interest and experience in Health Care and Software will be considered but not required.