1. A little bit about Margot:

Enrolled in Rotman Commerce, University of Toronto

Currently Year 4; Specialized in public accounting

2. What did she do in the summer?

Sales & Trading intern at Scotiabank. Worked on the Derivative Products Group (DPG) desk. 

3. What is DPG?

DPG provides swap hedging instruments to clients, helping them hedge their debt against various factors such as interest rates and currency rates.

DPG has a macro outlook, very dependent on interest rates in the market.

DPG is under Debt Capital Markets (DCM), but I strictly work with DPG.

4. What does it mean by saying “hedging,” and what kind of clients did you work with?

Worked on the corporate side of DPG, working with large, established corporations. 

DPG issues Interest Rates Swaps and Cost Currency Swaps, helping clients hedge against interest rate risks and foreign exchange risks. If clients had taken old debts with floating rates on them, they don’t want to be exposed to fluctuations in interest rates. We help our clients hedge against that risk using Interest Rate Swaps. DPG provides a large array of products for different means.

5. Daily routine

Typically start between 7:15-7:25 AM

Morning:

Run a report goes to clients, updating them on changes and what happened on the market overnight. 

Afternoon:

Depends day to day. If we have a deal coming in, I need to get working on booking that trade or potentially pricing out the trade with marketers’ help. Usually, the day ends between 6-7 PM.

5. Most interesting thing about the job?

Pricing! Especially when you priced something out one day, and you have to reprice the next. How dramatic it changed depending on the rates are. How fast the market moves is interesting.

6. What do you dislike the most about the job?

The starting time is terrible, getting up just before 7 AM in the case of working from home now. If I need to commute and be around my desk around 7:15 AM, it would be an earlier morning than right now.

7. How do you learn those technical things like pricing?

Not something learnt in school.

The team is great with manuals set up for interns, and incoming interns can learn all the pricing. It’s NOT something you need to know coming in or they expect you to know. It’s something you learn on the desk. Defiantly did not know this in the first week. It has taken me 4 months to master it. Just keep practicing and asking other people on my desk.

8. Few personality traits that people in DPG would need to have.

Lots of communication with people beyond who just sit on the DPG desk.

Communication with other teams in Sales and Trading is required for you to be able to originate the sales. DPG falls under DCM on the fixed income side. Lots of our products are issued on the back of some debt that the client is taking on. We need to know when the client is taking on a debt that you potentially hedge against. Good communications with traders are also required. They are the ones who help us price out the trades in some cases.

9. Last advice for people interested in Sales and Trading as a whole.

Ask around and network. So many teams in S&T I didn’t know about until I became an intern. So many different teams in S&T. It would be really great to reach out to people on those desks and learn more about them.

Reach out to students who have done a summer internship in S&T and learn about where/which groups they interned. Even after 4 months of internship, there are so many different areas that I don’t know about (in S&T). Maybe it’s great to get a head start on learning about them.