My Internship at Nomura - Essay Example

In the first week of my internship at Nomura, I went to the Bloomberg office to attend a Bloomberg training session. Even though I have experience inusing the Bloomberg before, there were a lot of commands and functions I did not know earlier. I found the tips and procedures on how to use Bloomberg API especially interesting since these help you pull market data from Bloomberg into Excel, and I actually ended up using this function a lot during the internship. From the third to fourth week, there were the training courses for summer interns to attend. Of course, it was fascinating to listen to members from the desks I am interested in, such as trading and sales. But it was also a great opportunity for me to understand the other desks that I didn’t really know about, such as back office teams. I discovered that in this industry, though people focus more on the front office, the back office and middle office are actually quite important. They support the front office: impressive front offices wouldn’t exist without well-organized back and middle offices. About the buddy system, I didn’t have an exact buddy during this internship program. However, I had many chances to interact with junior members from different desks. This helped me to a great extent to understand more about Nomura. Jason from IT, Mark from US rates trading, Jerry from credit trading, Tan, Yuichiro and Bruce from research, and Dennis from JGB swap trading were all great sources of learning. I had some of my meals with these young members, interacted with them when they were at work, and these experiences have brought me very close to some of these talented members of the Nomura team. I could share my dilemmas with them, and they often gave me great advice when I encountered problems, or encouraged me when I was upset. Also, while interacting with them, I could picture myself working at Nomura as a junior, and it helped me imagine how I could contribute as a junior member. During the internship, I also had several opportunities of meeting key people in Nomura. I realized that Nomura has lots of all-star players in this industry. Especially, I was thoroughly impressed with our CEO. He was quite eloquent and persuasive during the interview meeting, and I was fascinated by the speed and intelligence of his reactions to my ideas and queries. I see why he is one of the most successful people in this industry and why Nomura is expanding right now. In addition, I really appreciate Mr.Osone who just let me come into his office whenever I stopped by, and gave me so much of his time. I’ve never met such an executive who tries so hard to improve the internship program and hiring system, and cares about the interns and new grads. He is the one I would like to keep in touch with and/or work for. The social events were very important for me too. The welcome reception on the very first day let me meet many of the Nomura people and understand the organization better, and it really helped because I didn’t really know the people and the company at that time. Also, the Inter-bank reception allowed me to meet other Nomura people who I hadn’t come to know yet and gave me the chance to talk to members who I already knew by sight, but had not had the opportunity to interact with. It was interesting to exchange views on Nomura with interns from other firms, and it was very useful to meet these interns because I might see them in this industry in future. The Hanabi event was also a wonderful occasion to watch fireworks with intern-mates and managers. At the time of this event, interns were acquainted with each other already, but it was a valuable chance to meet not only with all the overseas interns but also students from Japanese universities. This could prove to be significant one day since we may be working together in Nomura or somewhere in the same company or industry in future. The culture of Nomura in Tokyo is very vibrant and exceptionally efficient. The company is expanding right now, making huge profits every year, and I am sure this acceleration would not come to a halt for many more years to come. Nomura’s name may not be well-recognized yet, but as I can see from the experiences of my junior mentors, this company provides excellent learning and growth opportunities to new entrants. Nomura invests in people who are strongly motivated. They are of course looking for people with ability and knowledge, but at the same time they’re also seeking people who are inspired, and really want to succeed in this industry. For the internship program, I do not have too many complaints or suggestions to make. Maybe it would be a positive idea if overseas interns can take a look at and gain experience from more desks just like the interns from the universities in Japan do. I have interned in several firms in this industry, so I had a concept of what the inside of investment bank looks like. But one thing I had determined from my interviews with Nomura executives even before coming to this firm was that the people here are very amiable. During the internship, I found out that Nomura people work really hard and take on additional important responsibilities all the time. Many Nomura people have a great sense of humor, but when they are working, they are very serious and concentrate on their job at hand above all else. In JGB trading, Mr.Daimon was my stern mentor, but I really appreciate him so much because I learned a lot about the markets from him. Many of the seniors confessed they envied me or asked me what I had learned from him because I was the only one who had this opportunity. I would never forget what he taught me about handling different situations, and I would think about his words every time I encounter such difficulties. Traders always think of their profit and loss, and I knew I was probably a loss to a trader in terms of time and effort. But Mr.Daimon spent a lot of his time and energy on me and taught me many things about the market, and in that I consider myself very fortunate. Not just Mr.Daimon, but all of the mentors at Nomura were truly exceptional. My work may not have been up to professional standards many a time, but my mentors invariably gave their thanks and sometimes even made a complimentary remark for me when I submitted my projects. That always encouraged me and kept me motivated. I really appreciate all of them putting their efforts to make my internship program an invaluable one. I would like to thank all of them who supported me during this internship, and I hope to see them again soon. Read More