Two Vietnamese girls are among a five-member student team from La Trobe University, who have won the Australian round of the CFA Global Investment Research Challenge.

According to La Trobe University, the Vietnamese students are Hua Thi Kim Chau and Le Nguyen Ngoc Anh.

The team will represent Australia in Bali next February at the Asian finals of the prestigious contest to vie for a ticket to the CFA Global Investment Research Challenge Final, to be held in the US in April.

The Challenge is designed to promote best practices in equity research and company analysis, as students research, analyse, and report on a company as if they are practicing analysts.

The participating students are required to analyse and value a publicly listed company and report their valuation and recommendation both in the form of a written stock report and as a verbal presentation and defence of the argument and recommendation to a panel of leading investment industry professionals.

Over 2,000 finance and trade students worldwide took part in the 2010 Challenge.

The CFA Global Investment Research Challenge is run by CFA Institute, which has more than 100,000 members in 130 countries and territories around the world./.