Anyone here working in the finance industry in Canada?
I am currently working at my first finance related job as a fund accountant, and while I’m glad to be working and gaining experience I know its not something I want to stay at.
I would like to get a job as a analyst or something more related to the international side of things. I have already passed CFA level one and will write level 2 next year.
Any advice or past experiences would be greatly appreciated.
Nobody?
[quote]aiden wrote:
Anyone here working in the finance industry in Canada?
I am currently working at my first finance related job as a fund accountant, and while I’m glad to be working and gaining experience I know its not something I want to stay at.
I would like to get a job as a analyst or something more related to the international side of things. I have already passed CFA level one and will write level 2 next year.
Any advice or past experiences would be greatly appreciated.
[/quote]
Hey Aiden,
I work in Finance in NYC–currently at a French i-bank. I used to work for TD and travel to Toronto occasionally. It sounds like you’re off to a good start, especially if you’ve passed CFA level one.
It’s a pain in the ass but if you can get through all 3 at a young age it’s definitely worth it. Being a Fund accountant isn’t bad as a first job but I’d try to move to something else if you want to be an analyst. Accounting has a limited future though, if you’re doing FA for Hedge Funds you could get a foot in the door.
Do you want to be an equity/bond analyst? If you’re at a decent sized (not just retail) bank you might have a few options: Middle Office–gives you a good grounding in all sorts of financial products–stay away from back office–no future there.
Risk Management is good but usually requires some experience–again you’ll get a good quantitative knowledge of all products as well as learning about VaR, Monte Carlo, etc. Usually have some bright, academic types in Risk–far different from Front Office.
Finally, if you want to go for the big $–trading–you can be a gopher and whipping boy for Front Office i.e. traders. They’ll treat you like crap and you’ll be shocked at how little many of them know.
If you want to go Int’l most of the main banks have branches around the world. I knew lots of guys from Canada who came to work at TD in NYC and London. My main advice would be to get as much education as you can now because later, as you get older, married, working alot–you won’t want to spend hours studying–most likely.
The finance field has gtten very technical in the past several years–i.e. derivatives, CDS, swaptions, exotics are the norm–not the exception. An MBA speciailizing in Financial Engineering along with a CFA will set you up pretty well from the academic side. FRMs are getting more popular also.
There are alot of other areas, structured finance is quite interesting–I worked on a large project and enjoyed it. Basic i-banking has changed a bit. Everyone wanted in during the .com boom because it was like printing money. More challenging now as we’re seeing fewer IPOs and a move back to M+A–yet another interesting area which is quite challenging to get into.
Anyways, either PM me or respond to this string with a few more details.
Best of luck