PHILADELPHIA, Oct. 24, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Penn Capital Management Company, Inc. (Penn Capital) is proud to announce the launch of PRIME (Philadelphia Regional Investing Mentorship Experience), a program to help empower minority female students to become tomorrow’s financial services leaders.

Through a partnership with Invest in Girls, Penn Capital is sponsoring a three-year financial literacy and investing curriculum that spans a student’s sophomore through senior years of high school. The first class of 15 students from the Academy@Palumbo, a School District of Philadelphia magnet high school, began the program on October 20, 2017.

Per Melissa Currie, Director of Marketing of Digital Solutions, “The PRIME program builds on the legacy of Penn Capital’s founders Rich and Marcia Hocker who have been strong supporters of achievement through education with the sponsorship of over 100 at-need elementary and high school students through the Ethel Mae Hocker Foundation.”

“As has been well-documented, the number of women, particularly minority women, in the investment management industry is very low. Those women who do pursue careers in our industry generally gravitate to larger investment management firms with broader diversity programs,” adds Kirsten Hocker, Director of Human Resources. 

Devon Mercurius, Program Director for Invest in Girls adds, "Invest in Girls is excited to be partnering with Penn Capital on this initiative. Our collaboration through their PRIME program expands our reach into the city of Philadelphia which furthers our goal of providing financial literacy education to all girls." 

Finally, Pete Moran, Partner, and Executive Vice President of Global Distribution says, “As capital structure specialists, we believe in looking at the whole issue to determine how we can contribute to solving a problem. Therefore, as a boutique manager located in Philadelphia we believe that working to address this issue at the grass-roots level allows us to not only focus on growing the number of minority women in our industry, but we also hope to attract some of those candidates as future talent for our own firm.”

Inquiries can be sent to Melissa Currie, Director of Marketing and Digital Solutions at mcurrie@penncapital.com or (215) 302-1539.

Penn Capital, founded in 1987, is an independent investment management firm located in Philadelphia, PA.  Penn Capital maintains a fully integrated credit and equity research process and emphasizes Complete Capital Structure Analysis® when analyzing investment opportunities.  Penn Capital has approximately $4.6 billion in assets under management (as of September 30, 2017, including non-discretionary assets associated with model delivery accounts) and specializes in high yield fixed income and micro-to-mid capitalization equity portfolios for institutions and individuals.