Summer Analyst Review

I have completed two internships before, both in London and overseas but this internship beat them on any single point. Everything from the people and the culture to the facilities were fantastic and I would say that I could not imagine having a better summer than I had this year.

As I had projects that were useful for the teams I rotated in that were useful for them and still will be useful after I leave the internship I feel that I have been highly valued and useful for the team. As they also spent a lot of time with me when they were busy I felt like they truly valued me.

The support and time given from both management and the teams I have been in has been invaluable for me. It has truly helped me to excel in the way I think I have done, e.g. when I have needed help and there has been a busy time on the trading floor the team has still tried to help me as good as they can.

In general I would say that I have been very busy on a daily basis, this is due to the rotational aspect of the programme and the need to network with other desks. This takes time from the work and must be done during evenings and hence there has been a busy but at the same time highly rewarding, but this is the way I like it.

As we had a rotational programme with new desks every week there was not a lot of responsibility given to the interns, and this makes sense due to the rotational nature. But given this, I would say that I was given a lot of responsibility as the projects I completed were useful for the team eve after I left.

As I will write my master thesis within FX options and I spent a lot of time on the FX options desk I would say that all the skills I developed during the internship, both theoretical skills and the technical side of options trading will be very useful in my further degree studies.

The atmosphere was really good, super intensive and collaborative. The culture was amazing where people really cared about your time here and people always tried to help whenever they could, both interns and the regular employees; this is something I really appreciate. I really liked the buzz on the trading floor it helped to create a great atmosphere and this is how it should be on the trading floor.

The overall placement was very well organized, maybe in the very beginning there was a too little to do, in particular before the formal one-week rotations started in week four. I would like to have it a bit more intense and more real work to do in the first 10 weeks to give it 10 starts.

The firm really invested in us from the very beginning, where we started with one week class room training and many business spotlight sessions where senior people from all sales, trading, and structuring desks came and discussed their career and the work on their desks in order to make us aware of their position within the firm.

Working at Goldman has always been my dream so future employment would be the most appealing option for me, and I can even stress this further after spent 10 weeks at the firm. I would turn down offers from any sell side or buy side organisation within the trading space for a spot at Goldman’s grad scheme.

Yes, I would say that the intern class was very close and we had many outside activates which was not arranged by HR were many participated, e.g. drinks every Friday and many other events in the first weeks. It seemed that the people came very well along and had much fun both on the job and outside.

As I was based in London the rent for a short le contract was very high and I spent the majority of the salary on accommodation. Food and much other stuff were not too pricy so you it worked fine anyway as we all had a very good salary as an intern.

To be honest I did not really explore the nightlife in London this year, but I have done a previous summer internship in London last summer and them I explored it and can say that it is very good in general but also very expensive compared to other large European cities.

There were many groups you could join at Goldman, but I did not join any of these groups, e.g. there exists football teams and a large variety of affinity networks interns can join. Other events could be different networking events, Community Team Works day and charity work, which is highly encouraged by the firm.