Behaviourals

Question 1

Weaknesses

Answer 1

on the personal side i’ve received feedback that i tend o talk very quickly when I’m excited about something. This is something I’ve tackled with toastmasters, where you often have to give unprompted talks about various random topics

Question 2

Strengths

Answer 2

honest, analytical, draw energy from challenges, persistent

talk about idea screening going through the russell 2000

Question 3

bad experience with team work

Answer 3

Team Work
• Every class in university had some team component
• lots of experience working in teams, some high performing, others had opportunities to improve.
• the most challenging, but insightful time was in an international team when i was on exchange in a global ethics class and tasked with analyzing apple from a global supply chain perspective.
• We didn’t spend enough time getting to know each other personally or professionally , didn’t communicate objective and standards.
• One of the challenging components was whether your school was pass/fail or actually graded
• importance of understanding cultural barriers and over communicate rather than under communicate
• especially eliciting insight and giving feedback, being aware of cultural norms and standards is critical.

Question 4

Why this bank/firm

Answer 4

truly be able to be long term, focus on management, team based environment.

Having smart people who can challenge the way you think

Question 5

Something not on my resume

Answer 5

How much I like to read, optimize retention and learning and self improvement. Constantly benchmarking myself to find ways to improve

something exciting about tracking and measuring progress whether its fitness or health related or spending habits

Question 6

Leadership style

Answer 6

i would say that im someone who wants the right answer. it doesnt necessarliy have to be mine

i like taking control and executing a plan

Question 7

Give me an example of a time you have gone above and beyond what was expected of you

Answer 7

Trying to provide unique insights in due diligence, more familiar with social media searches, compiling past statements. Especially when i feel like I’m pursing information that isn’t publicly reflected, there is a certain thrill about that.

*talk about customer centric approach here. Satisfying the ultimate need of the customer goes above and beyond doing what is asked directly

Question 8

Why are you the best candidate

Answer 8

Abilitry to push my ego aside to win for the team. understand that the needs of the team outway my needs at the momenet.

chris rock, someone has to play the tambourine

Question 9

exchange

Answer 9

great experience, thought i could leverage my knowledge in french to understand more of the culture

lots of finance courses

experience working in international teams

Question 10

favourite book (s)

Answer 10

1. intelligent investor
2. the paradox of choice
3. zero to one

Question 11

what is your strategy or edge

Answer 11

structural,
kind of a cope out, but being able to take long term views about investments and stomach volatility. low turnover, high conviction portfolio

Question 12

how do you determine when and what to sell

Answer 12

Depends on the investment (cheap asset vs. compounder)

1. thesis has changed
2. something else is much more attractive
3. reached intrinsic value

Question 13

if you had 10k to invest, what would you do with it

Answer 13

depends on risk preference, as a younger indivudaul who understands the histroical outperformance of equities. id be 100% equities, stomach for volatility

Question 14

why queen’s

Answer 14

best for finance, competivie environment, strong aluni base, small class size, business from day 1

similair to investing, needed to be in the right pond

Question 15

Great team experience

Answer 15

CAPSIM, management simulation, had an underperfoming team.

• learned the importance of picking the right team
• learned capital allocation
• learned about the importance of mgmt incentives

Question 16

tell me about your finance experience

Answer 16

Experiencing investing PA, developped strategy over time, attending finance conference, CFA, CSC, investment clubs

Question 17

why would you be the best candidate

Answer 17

i could say that I’m Passionate about finance, i work hard, but everyone says that.

i’d be the best because i can check my ego. story about trading floor

Question 18

what is your process on managing risk

Answer 18

1. permanant loss of capital
2. vol, beta are poor proxies for risk
3. time horizon

Question 19

how do you look for stocks

Answer 19

Changed over time. I used to rely heavily on screens, but there are many pitfalls, such as one time charges, statistically cheap doesn’t mean good buy etc.

try to build a mosaic and understanding of the world by really reading lots of annual reports. by understanding the verticals, competitors and landscape you build compounding knowledge

learn a lot, philosophy, politics, pshycoholy, math

use VCs, to learn about how they think about the future. they’re usually right but not on the time horizon

Question 20

what is your circle of competence

Answer 20

1. consumer goods,
2. some tech
   3
   what is more important are companies i wont cover
3. anything with singifiant off balance sheet aragnemtn
4. cyclycial/ resources based stock s

Question 21

what i learned from investing my own money

Answer 21

1. built scar tissue
2. learned difference between reality and theory
   “In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.
3. eg. market efficiency

Question 22

Hobbies

Answer 22

reading
travelling
having interesting conversations with interesting people

on the active side, martial arts surfing and squash

Question 23

why did you study business

Answer 23

fascinating with finance and investing

Question 24

where do you see yourself in 5 years

Answer 24

Given where I am now compared to where i was 5 years ago, i think its pretty difficult to say. however, i want to become a better analyst, a more serious role in the firm. since investing is a mentorship business, i hope i have learned enough by that point to start giving back to new analysts

have cfa

eventually i want to run my own shop

Question 25

what is your greatest reservation about working in asset management

Answer 25

inability to talk about investment ideas with friends. ? (work on this )

Question 26

Give me an example where you came with a creative solution to a
problem.

Answer 26

Had to find historical data for firms that were no longer publicly listed, used 10K information to compile .

talk about looking at pinaccle assets?

Question 27

What motivates you

Answer 27

Buffet talks a lot about the difference between an inner scorecard and outerscore card. I think one of my greatest strengths is my ability to judge myself based on internal metrics rather than outside validation. I want to get better at what i do everyday and go to bed smarter than i when i wake up. I don’t think many other jobs allow you to do that

Question 28

Why finance

Answer 28

I want to get better at what i do everyday and go to bed smarter than i when i wake up. I don’t think many other jobs allow you to do that.

highly competitive which pushes me to be better

combined with responsibility of generating returns for clients

Question 29

how do you manage stress

Answer 29

not well. jk

humour is one way, not taking everything so seriously or personally. and squash/ exercise.

Question 30

tell us about a time that you made a mistake and what you learned from it

Answer 30

on the investment side, i invested in an oil tanker company because i thought oil had played out. huge mistake. learned not to time macro, avoid highly levered, cyclical companies, or at least drawing out peak earnings over the long term.

another mistake: had to pitch an LBO, our team pitched that we should buyout 3m. turns out that company is larger than the LBO market at the time. do your due diligence of what can kill a deal or investment from the start

Question 31

Tell me how you handled a difficult situation./ multiple priorities

Answer 31

Studying for CFA exams the week after a conference before 4th year finals. i juggled this by preparing early, studying hard in advance and getting by with less sleep.

very few things can’t be solved by throwing sheer hours at it

Question 32

What did you learn from taekwondo

Answer 32

Humility, discipline and leadership. I was a member of a high performance demonstration team and was responsible for training jr members. I also taught students with learning disabilities in the school. This taught me empathy (see things from their perspective) and distill information into its most essential parts

Question 33

do you have any questions for us?

Answer 33

Training

Interviewing management teams

Question 34

how did you hear about our firm

Answer 34

Update depending on firm

Question 35

why do you want to work here

Answer 35

charlie munger put it best for rules for a career.

1. never sell somehting you wouldnt buy yourself
2. dont work for anyone you dont respect or admire
3. work only with people you enjoy

there was this interesting article in the WSJ a while back, talked about how returns can be affected by your environement and who you surround yourself with.

importance of similar/ shared values/ investing principles.

Question 36

tell us about a difficult decision you made how, you came to it and what you would change

Answer 36

choosing to leave a full time buy side seat for an internship in toronto for 4 months for half the pay and quadruple the monthey expenditures with the markets at all time highs

i knew early on in my career, more importnat to learn, eg. buffett offered to wrork for graham for free