GMF students visit JP Morgan, prestigious firms in NYC

We started the day of May 18 by visiting Clayton, Dubilier & Rice (CD&R), one of the oldest private equity investment firms in the world. Walking on the street, we can sense the passion and energy that embrace the morning of New York City.

Founded in 1978, CD&R today manages investments of approximately $17 billion in 52 businesses. Approximately sixty percent of CD&R’s transactions have involved corporate divestitures.

During the session, one practitioner shared insightful market views of the pharmaceutical industry with us, such as the recent market momentum, how to locate companies conformed to their investment thesis, and how to quantify the risk involved. Additionally, three young associates also shared their valuable career experience with us, such as how they found their passion, how to learn a completely unfamiliar industry or product, and how to develop their own market perception. During this presentation, we had a very unique experience to visit a world-leading PE firm and interact with senior practitioners. It did inspire us a lot, from the big picture of PE industry to the details such as how to make a good deal.

After lunch and a short rest, we visited the headquarters of JPMorgan Chase & Co. We spent almost a whole afternoon in this exquisite building, where trillions of assets are under management. The office floor of JPMorgan Chase & Co. is very elegant, with several works of art decorating the hallway, making us feel professional and at the same time artistic.

During the visit, we had a lot of insightful conversations with staff members from different divisions, as well as several educational lectures provided by JP Morgan staff.

All of the lecturers and hosts were very professional, and we could feel that they were full of passion for their jobs. They were generous to share their personal market perspective with us, answering our questions comprehensively and thoroughly. Based on some fundamental knowledge we have learned in our courses, the lecturers expanded on the applications of concepts, and how the real world operates.

JP Morgan left us with an extraordinary impression of its awareness of global trends, understanding of the market, and its rigorous and advanced strategies of investment. In this visit, we not only learned how financial markets run in reality, but also got a sense of how to build our career paths toward financial experts and how to build our own view to the markets around the globe.

We concluded the day by returning to our hotel on the same street, but we are more certain about our future.

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Guest Bloggers: Wan Syuan (Susan) Chen, Shuhuan (Alice) Fu, Shuangqing (Sean) Wang, Guanhao (Jeffrey) Zeng (GMF 2017)

This is a series of blogs chronicling the experiences of 42 Global Master of Finance (GMF) dual degree students during their two week immersion course in New York and Washington, DC. Each blog will be written by a small subset of students during their experience. Names of speakers and presenters at firms are anonymous at the request of the firms and course organizers.