Fixed Income Strategy & Analysis > Associate

Roles of an Associate

Roles an Associate may undertake:

• Prepare reports for distribution to customers that describe in detail the properties of a new product in the market
• Build a spreadsheet for use by traders to price a new product and/or to calculate the market sensitivities of that product
• Go with a salesperson to meet with a client to describe a recent research project or provide perspectives on current market conditions
• Improve upon existing quantitative models or build new models to estimate important aspects of market behavior, such as mortgage prepayments, changes in corporate credit, or interest rate movements
• Work with a senior strategist on published periodicals describing market conditions, price movements, asset pricing, and proposing trade ideas for distribution to our global investor base

Our Programs

Full Time Associate

What is Quantitative Analysis?
For someone with a strong quantitative background and good communication skills, Citi's FISA division is an ideal place to work, a dynamic environment where business intuition and mathematical savvy are equally vital. Working closely with sales and trading, our role as strategists and quants is to take a broader and deeper view of the market, to harness quantitative know-how to real-time market intelligence, and to communicate our ideas effectively to internal and external clients. In contrast to many other banks, Citi's FISA encourages its employees to gain experience across products and markets, allowing for unlimited career development opportunities. Given its global scope and depth of expertise at innovating cutting-edge products, Citi is a place you can grow with.

How is this related to the Sales & Trading businesses?
Our strategists also keep the salespeople and traders in the investment bank up to date with its thinking about various industry sectors and specific stocks and fixed income products. We work closely with the sales force to explain to customers the current market climate and potential investment opportunities via written publications and on visits to clients offices. We also provide analytical and risk management support for our trading teams, enabling them to better price assets, understand the risks that they are taking and to develop new products.

It is important to note that when you join the Associate program, you are assigned to one group. Assignments are based on a combination of your personal preferences and business needs.

Full-time Associate Training begins each year in August. If hired for the Associate Program, you will enter a fast-track training period that will introduce you to our business, and the opportunities available to you. Several weeks of classroom training and product orientation will develop your understanding of securities analytics, prepare you for licensing with industry regulators, introduce the Firm's vast resources, and help you develop a global network of peers from every area the Firm.

Summer Associate

The Summer Associates will partake in a ten-week intern program to work on advanced problems in Fixed Income modeling. Our Summer Associates work closely with senior researchers on important business problems.

The role of Fixed Income Quantitative Research is to determine the value of debt securities utilizing a complex set of analytical processes that measure such characteristics as earnings, revenue and margins. Of course, that's the simplistic definition. What we actually do comprises a varied and comprehensive set of skills and services, with the ultimate goal of helping investors minimize their risks and maximize their returns.

In addition to establishing and maintaining ongoing dialogues with internal and external customers, our responsibilities include:

• Developing theoretical financial models that illustrate how securities behave in different market environments
• Making specific investment recommendations
• Assisting clients identifying risks and select appropriate portfolio hedging strategies
• Providing credit analysis
• Helping customers understand their portfolios so they can restructure or make performance projections
• Publishing reports on fixed-income markets around the world

Day-to-day we interact constantly with the Sales and Trading Division making recommendations they can pass on to clients, helping them trade market securities to clients and going on sales calls. We build tools and models that assist traders in pricing, hedging and structuring securities, and provide critical information and advice for managing risk within the Fixed Income Division and throughout the Firm. 

Structurally, Fixed Income Quantitative Research is built around product groups. This allows us, and you, to specialize in a particular area, developing an in-depth expertise that divisions throughout the Firm, from Global Banking to Capital Markets, as well as clients will come to rely on.

Groups

• Interest Rate Product Research
• Mortgage Security and Asset-Backed Security Research
• Corporate Bond Research
• Emerging Markets
• Global Fixed Income Index Research

The Summer Associates will participate in a ten-week intern program to work on advanced problems in Fixed Income modeling. Our Summer Associates work closely with senior researchers on important business problems. Typically Summer Associates will work on more than one problem across one or more asset types. In addition, Summer Associates attend a bi-weekly seminar in which senior strategists from various areas in the Firm provide overviews of their markets and their strategic approaches to analyzing those respective sectors.

Summer Diaries

Summer Diary by Carolina Marquez

This past summer I was a summer associate in the Emerging Markets Strategy group. Work on my project started on day one. Even though there were a few issues that needed to be resolved with the computer setup, I met with my supervisor and was given several papers to start reading. Over the summer I would be working on one specific project. The goal was to create a model for estimating the relationship between the spread on emerging market sovereign debt and economic fundamentals. This is an important model that is in great demand by the strategists and traders.

On the first day I had lunch with the members of my group that work in New York. To fully cover all the markets in our sector we have people in Hong Kong, Singapore, and London. We also work frequently with the economists who are based in the local offices such as Brazil, Argentina and Mexico. The team sits on the trading desk to be able to interact closely with the traders. Unfortunately I was not able to sit with them due to space constraints. I was sitting in the research offices. This turned out to be great because I was able to work closely with the economists, and they were an essential resource for my project.

I found early on that I had to take charge of my project. The team is very busy with the day-to-day demands from traders and clients as well as the daily publications. They are very open and enthusiastic, but there are many demands on their time. I found that the best way to communicate was by writing up very specific notes outlining the issues I was working on and the questions that I had. Once the team had a chance to review the note we could schedule time to discuss it in greater detail. I also felt that it was important to set aside time every day to read the internal publications. In this way I was able to understand how my project fit into the overall work of the division.

The biggest challenge with my project was collecting the data and creating a robust platform that would be useful to the team once the summer was over. Since we wanted to create a model that would encompass several countries, it was necessary to find data that was consistently measured for all the countries. We also wanted to create a database that could be easily accessed and updated so that it could be used in other applications such as client presentations. In the end the team was very happy with the results. I was able to develop a model that accurately estimated sovereign debt spreads, and set up a platform for trade analysis. In the last few weeks of the summer we presented our results to the other summer associates in research and their managers. It was interesting to see the wide variety of projects, and gratifying to find interest in my project from other product teams.

Aside from the work in my group I had exposure to other areas of the business through the Distinguished Speaker Series and the Summer Associate networking events. It was very interesting to learn about the future of Citi from executives in different areas of the company. I also enjoyed hearing their career stories and the advice they had for us as summer interns. The Summer Associate networking events were a great opportunity to experience new places around New York and to get to know our fellow summer associates and mentors in a more relaxed environment. Overall this internship has been an excellent experience. I gained valuable knowledge about the day-to-day demands of fixed income research, and met many interesting people. I know that I will be wondering what is going on at the trading floor when I am back in school.

Who we are looking for

Since 2001, we have been selecting several third-year Ph.D. students in Finance, Economics, or other quantitative fields as well as candidates who are obtaining Master's in Financial Engineering.

The Summer Associate Program has been a successful route into the Firm for one or more interns each year since its inception. In general, we look for candidates with the same characteristics as those we hire for permanent positions. These include strong mathematical and technical skills, the ability to carry on creative research and synthesize information, as well as the ability to communicate effectively with customers, colleagues, traders and salespeople.

For our Full Time Associate Program, we hire talented people to develop innovative assessments of opportunities in the market and effectively communicate their information and ideas. Successful candidates will have an MS or Ph.D. in a quantitative field such as Computer Science, Economics, Engineering, Finance, Mathematics, Operations Research, Physics or Statistics. Good analytical and computer skills (C/Java preferable) are critical. Because an Associate is required to interact directly with the Firm's clients, salespeople and traders, strong interpersonal, writing and speaking skills are also important. Although a background in finance or economics is advantageous, we believe that candidates with exceptionally strong quantitative skills can come to a deep understanding of the financial markets.

Recruitment Process

Full Time Associate

We begin the formal full time recruiting process in early September in the form of an on-campus presentation. All students are invited to attend to learn more about the culture, the business and the people at Citi. Following that, job descriptions are posted through university career centers. After all resumes have been collected, a closed, targeted list of first-round candidates is compiled. First-round interviews take place at a designated location during October - December. Successful interviewees are invited back for second-round interviews, at which time they will meet with business professions from the group. Offers are extended as soon thereafter as possible and there are usually three Associate slots to fill.

Summer Associate

We begin the formal MBA recruiting process in early September in the form of an on-campus presentation. All students are invited to attend to learn more about the culture, the business and the people at Citi. Following that, job descriptions are posted through university career centers. After all resumes have been collected, a closed, targeted list of first-round candidates is compiled. First-round interviews take place at a designated location from October - December. Successful interviewees are invited back for second-round interviews, at which time they will meet with business professionals from the group. Offers are extended as soon thereafter as possible, usually to about four people.

Our People

Terry Benzschawel Ph.D., in Experimental Psychology, Indiana University, 1980, Post-Doctoral Fellow in Optometry, University of California Berkeley, 1980-1982, Post-Doctoral Fellow in Ophthalmology, Johns Hopkins Medical School, 1982-1984. Director, Credit Modeling

Lauren Moskovitz University of Pennsylvania (2004)- Management and Technology Program (B.S. in Economics from the Wharton School, B.A.S. in computer science from the School of Engineering) Associate

What do you consider Citi's competitive edge?

Citi's long-term success has provided the Firm with a vast network of resources to achieve both knowledge and historical perspective. As a result, the training environment that is provided for younger employees is unparalleled in the industry. In addition, the sheer size of the organization allows for numerous opportunities for cross-marketing, drawing on the expertise across divisions to create unique products for the increasing number of sophisticated investors. In just my experiences as an analyst and associate, I have worked with a number of other departments in the firm to expand the services we can provide to our customers.

How would you describe your team and the people you work with?

Enthusiastic and incredibly driven, the people I work with provide a supportive and motivating environment to learn and grow in this business. My colleagues come from different degrees and training programs, supplying a diverse set of knowledge and varied opinions. In my average day, I will not only learn something new about finance, but also about different cultures, music, and even foreign sports.

What other groups do you liaise with regularly within the Firm?

As a part of the municipal derivatives group, I most often communicate with the municipal institutional cash business and municipal retail business. On a regular basis, we also work with the taxable fixed income sales force to roll out products across divisions, as well as other financing desks to expand our product reach. In addition, I have used the contacts I made in my first year in the Strategy and Analysis department to trade information back and forth in order to create more advanced analysis in my second role as a trader in Municipal derivatives.

How do you apply your degree to what you're doing now?

I had a dual degree in both Finance and Computer Science as an undergraduate. Besides having a theoretical advantage from my finance background, my computer science degree was incredibly helpful in creating advanced tools and analysis in both my strategy and derivatives trading role. An engineering skill set is increasingly useful in finance as the market becomes more technically advanced.

What do you enjoy doing outside work?

Since I have moved to New York City, I’ve explored different activities after work, ranging from book clubs to cooking classes. I’ve recently developed a love for improvisational acting, taking classes at different theaters and performing with a group on the weekends. The best part about this city is that for any interest you have, you will always find a host of other people that will share in it with you.