Jeff Gottesman ’19 pitched Morgan Stanley (MS) to the Student Managed Investment Fund (SMIF) on October 15, 2018. Morgan Stanley is one of the largest banks in the world with some $865 billion in total assets and a market cap of around $80 billion. MS provides people, companies, and institutional investors the financial products and services they need to achieve their financial goals. Morgan Stanley’s three main business segments are institutional securities, wealth management, and investment management. The majority of the company’s revenue is generated by their investment banking, trading, and asset management services. The company’s strategy under the leadership of James Gorman has been to emphasize more stable businesses like wealth and asset management and de-emphasize riskier and less predictable businesses like stock and bond trading. Additionally, MS has been focusing on the reduction of their expenses and has increased margins in all three business segments. MS plans to return value to shareholders through stock repurchases and increased dividend payouts. The class voted to commit 1.90% of the equity portion of our portfolio to Morgan Stanley.