>> My names is Scott Walters, I'm a trader
for Lay Mason Private Portfolio Group.
The private portfolio group administers
somewhere around 35,000 accounts
across the country, and has around
$15 billion under management.
My primary responsibility is to
trade on behalf of just a little
over 20 portfolio managers based out of New York
City and San Francisco; and coordinate with them
and all the other necessary
parties to accomplish that.
Shortly after 5:00 I begin my commute into New
York City, and during that commute I'm trying
to catch up on overseas information,
predominately Europe at that point,
because Asia will have been
closed for several hours
and I'll probably already know what had
happened in Asia the preceding evening.
Spending my morning getting prepared for my day,
so thinking about the economic releases that are
yet to come and how I'm going to best suit
my portfolio managers should they decide
to come in and trade that day.
I'll usually arrive at the office
around 7:00, a little before or after,
and spend my time between 7:00 and 9:30
continuing to get prepared for the day ahead,
or we may already have orders in the European
or Asian markets which we're working throughout.
Well, 5:00 might not be necessary for
everyone; I've got a little bit longer commute
than some other people, but
I think that it's important
to get the day started on the right foot.
Although I hadn't scheduled a class my
freshman year before noon the first semester,
this is just a lifestyle difference.
And what's great about being a trader
is when the New York market's shut down,
generally the vast majority
of work is done for the day.
Come 4:30 or so, if I've done all the
preparation work correctly throughout the day,
I can usually shut down my station and try
and get home at a reasonable hour and allow
for a quality of life on the backend of my day.
I think the thing I pride myself most
on, the thing I take the most enjoyment
from is the activity with the marketplace
and the changing dynamics of the marketplace.
There are no two days that I come
to work that should be the same.
If I've completed two days of work identically,
it's because I've done many
things wrong throughout the day.
Based on the fluctuations of the markets
throughout the day and the changing nature
of the business place, I should always
be looking for new and better ways to try
and accomplish what we're doing, and also
observing new and evolving trading trends
in the marketplace and attempting to be aware
of that and to help to accomplish what it is
that we're attempting to
accomplish in that environment.
The hardest part of the job is probably,
as a generalist, I don't have the luxury
of focusing on what particular sector.
Some traders at shops where they have
more resources do have that ability
to get really narrow and focus, dive
deeply into their individual sector,
but within our current structure,
we don't have that luxury.
So trying to keep abreast of and to have
a thoughtful opinion on every sector,
every company within the S&P
500 is nearly impossible.
So just the amount of information flow today
is a big earnings day in the markets and trying
to be abreast of all the information, have
a thoughtful opinion on that information
and to continue to add value to your
portfolio managers is difficult.
And that's challenging; it's
not overly challenging
but it's very difficult aspect of the role.
I think that the vast majority of the investment
banks still offer great internship programs
for aspiring students, and that if you're able
to find your way into one of those programs,
there's no better way to break
into the sales and trading career.
I think that it's essential to learn as much
as you can while you're in the classroom
and not just to pass the classes
but to really retain the knowledge.
I wish I had an opportunity to go back and
take some of the classes that I've taken
and to retain a lot of that
knowledge, because it's really useful;
and I would implore any current students
to continue to really aspire to do as best
as they can in the classroom and retain
as much of that knowledge as possible.
So I'm a graduate of Penn State University, I
majored in Finance and minored in Economics.
When I first began to explore the different
business careers, I gravitated towards finance
because of my passion for the marketplace,
not just that I cared about where crude was
at that morning or what gas prices were doing
lately, but all of those peripheral markets
that maybe are not as interesting to some
other people were always interesting to me.
And I always wanted to learn more about what
made markets work and I have a real passion
for that and I continue to
have that passion to this day.
My first job began with one
internship with Citi Group
as a retail broker my sophomore
year at Penn State.
I helped him throughout the year
and that led me into my internship
with Merrill Lynch the following summer
where I had the opportunity to work
in the global markets program as a peon
for their sales and trading outfit.
I began in the equities trading group
and also had an opportunity to rotate
through bond trading and sales and also their
global epilink [phonetic] product at the time.
All those were great foundational
experiences which led me
to my first position which
was with Merrill Lynch.
Shortly thereafter, I began in their equities
sales and trading group and more specifically,
ended up landing within their
small cap equities trading group.
It was a terrific experience that allowed
me a lot of the foundational aspects
that I still employ to this day at Lay Mason
and I think had circumstances been differently
I'd still be there, but I think it all worked it
out as best as it could, and I'm happy
that that experience led me to be able
to build upon it and now work for Lay Mason.
I think that there are a lot of
simple things that go overlooked
when you're first entering the work force;
I think that simple things like always being
on time, telling the truth, even when its
hard to tell the truth and it may require you
to take a setback briefly in your
career or to take ownership of something
that is otherwise difficult is very important.
I think that soft skills are really essential
to succeeding especially in the early stages
of your career, no matter how much of
that knowledge that you've retained
or haven't retained in the classroom.
There's going to be an expectation that
there's a training period when you enter
into any career, so it's essential that you
bring with you the attitude that you're there
to learn from the people around you and to
build upon what it is that you've brought.
I would implore and really can't stress
enough the importance on relationships early
in your career and later in your
career and throughout your career.
I have the wonderful opportunity right now to
work for a manger who has shown me the value
of building relationships and how
important that can be to your career.
And I couldn't impress upon current and
future students enough relationship-building.