Bendegúz Pál Ruskal, a graduating student at ELTE Radnóti Miklós High School in Budapest, won a gold medal after finishing in 9th place at the international final of the Economics Olympiad in Olympia, Greece, on Thursday. In addition, the five-member Hungarian team won the macroeconomics team competition. As the main prize, the students will have the opportunity to participate in a three-week online course offered by Florida State University in spring 2027.
The Economics Olympiad was first organized in the Czech Republic in 2016. Since 2019, Hungary has also held a national competition and sent the top performers from the national final to the international final. The Hungarian competition is organized by the Hungarian Economic Association (HEA). The prestige of the competition is reflected in the fact that this year, as many as 160,000 secondary school students from 63 countries around the world took part, while nearly 150 students from 30 countries competed in the three-day international final in Greece.
Based on the results of the national final held at the end of March, Hungary was represented at the international final by Domán Nacsa (Erkel Ferenc High School, Gyula); Márton András Oláh (Illyés Gyula High School, Technical School and Vocational School, Budaörs); Szilárd Attila Ispán (ELTE Radnóti Miklós Practice High School, Budapest); Bendegúz Pál Ruskal (ELTE Radnóti Miklós High School, Budapest); and Vencel Kozák (II. Rákóczi Ferenc High School, Budapest). Over the course of the three-day competition, the students had to demonstrate their knowledge in three individual written rounds covering macroeconomics, microeconomics and finance. Based on the combined results of the three written rounds, Bendegúz Pál Ruskal finished among the top 10, earning a gold medal and qualifying for the oral examination before the international jury late Thursday afternoon. He ultimately finished in 9th place overall in the highly competitive international field.
For the first time in the history of the competition, the participants also had to complete a team task this year. The teams were asked to develop economic policy recommendations for the fictional Republic of Velmora – a small, open economy with a population of 8.4 million, high inflation, expensive housing costs, significant energy dependence and limited fiscal resources. The Hungarian students ranked among the top three teams in this task, allowing them, together with the Spanish and Kazakh teams, to present their recommendations orally to the jury. Their presentation proved highly successful, and the five Hungarian students ultimately won the gold medal in the macroeconomics team competition at the international final of the Economics Olympiad.
From the Hungarian team, Bendegúz Pál Ruskal will continue his studies in Cambridge from September, Vencel Kozák at Erasmus University Rotterdam, while Domán Nacsa, Márton András Oláh and Szilárd Attila Ispán will continue their studies at Corvinus University of Budapest.