Samuel Weaver

I am a Quantitative Trader in the Electronic Trading Team of HSBC’s Markets and Securities Services Global Foreign Exchange Trading business.

Our team is responsible for the trading platform that provides prices for dozens of currencies and some precious metals, Along with the pricing, we also manage this risk though algorithms through algorithms that our team designs and builds.

My job entails meeting clients to understand their strategies, as well as meeting vendors that service clients to make sure that we are up-to-date with any new developments. I collaborate with our sales team and voice traders to develop analytical tools and derive market insights. It is a highly engaging and dynamic role.

I first learned about HSBC at my college’s career fair. I was vaguely aware of the company at the time, but after speaking to the campus representative I felt that HSBC could be the place for me.

I had an outstandingly positive experience during both my internship and graduate program. I had amazing opportunities to learn about markets at large, specific products, practical economics, and what it was like to work in sales and trading.

I learned so much during my first year here thanks to the design of the program with its rotations between different roles and access to senior managers, who offered practical work and career advice. I learned so much and developed strong relationships with people that I would have not worked with so closely otherwise.

Despite being a relatively junior employee, I have had a rich career thus far at HSBC. During my first two rotations on the Graduate Program, I was able to strengthen relationships with co-workers that I had met in previous years while also familiarising myself with niches of markets that I had not been aware of previously. As I joined my last rotation, I found myself on the team that I am still a member of today and my career began to grow for the long term.

If you’re just starting out from school – or are about to graduate – I’d say try to find a job that gets you excited. When I saw that the material I’d studied had applicability to the role I was doing during my internship I was totally switch one.

Be willing to learn, be willing to work hard, and be willing to network.

Each extra step that you take will only enrich the fruits of your labour. I truly believe that you cannot decide whether you want to pursue a career within sales and trading or financial services at large until you are at least sufficiently familiar with those areas. And you will not become familiar with them without investing time and energy in them as you will do during an internship or graduate program.