Sales & Trading
Sales and trading professionals at investment banks have traditionally provided liquidity to institutional investors, buying and selling securities for clients. These securities include stocks, bonds, options, commodities, foreign exchange and derivatives. Clients include every variety of institutional money managers, from pension funds to hedge funds, to the investment arms of non-finance companies. While market-making still constitutes the majority of the business conducted on a trading floor, new investment products tailor the risk profiles of securities to clients' needs. The financial engineers who craft these new products are called structured product analysts.
What sets sales and trading teams apart from other finance professionals is that trading teams make money by putting money at risk. As a result, the trading floor is a high energy and high-pressure environment best suited for dynamic extroverts with excellent communication skills, strong quantitative abilities and thick skin. In general, traders spend their time managing risk and monitoring developments in the markets, while salespeople manage client relationships by communicating information and developing investment ideas. Both roles require mastery of an investment product and the ability to synthesize copious amounts of information into trading strategies. Structured product analysts work at a pace more akin to corporate finance. Like traders, structured product analysts need to have an intimate understanding of the mechanics of an instrument; and, like salespeople, they have to be in touch with the investment goals of their clients. Unlike traders and salespeople, structured product analysts invent, engineer and market new products that address the investment needs of clients as never before.
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