This summer, I interned at the investment banking division of the CCB principal Capital Management Co., Ltd. The company is located in Beijing, the capital of China. So far, I have been working here for seven weeks, and I can feel that my vision about financial industry and my future career life are already renewed.

Beijing is a very overwhelming city. To work and to live here requires a very high cost for housing. There are overwhelmingly many people on the morning subway. However, by overwhelming I do not mean it in a totally negative way. There is also a kind of hope that provides overwhelming power among the people here to face the struggles in their life.

Not sure if Beijing is the right city for me yet, but I am already attracted by the challenging and enriching tasks in the financial industry. In the department I am interning at, we are focusing on one investment banking product, which is called asset-back securitization. The asset-back securitization is a security that pools the asset into financial instruments, which allows them to be sold to general investors. The pools of underlying assets can be common payments from credit cards, auto loans, and mortgage loans, etc.

The project I am involved is with China Construction Seventh Engineering Division Corporation Ltd. We are going to create an asset pool of 900,000,000 RMB and make them to be securities. During this project, I have the opportunity to learn and actually calculate some significant data, audit the financial statements, edit and proofread the contracts, etc. As I get to understand the whole process of issuing and selling the securities, I become more aware of the importance of some mathematical tools that I learned back to school. This insight is very inspiring for a mathematics major like myself.

In addition, I also learn some skills that are not typically taught in a liberal arts college. For instance, to set up charts with a number of data and calculate the number we desire, we need to be able to manage to use Excel and to convey the data we get, we need to use PowerPoint. It is definitely a different scenario from making a chart and PowerPoint for a class project at school. To improve the efficiency, I need to learn and memorize many shortcuts on the Excel and for data visualization, I need to make the PowerPoint concise, clear and beautiful. Another very important lesson I learned throughout this internship is the necessity of communication skills, which I take as the most important skills in many career fields. Specifically in the financial industry, since the ability to master Excel can be cultivated through practice, the ability to communicate with other become the point to differentiate yourself from others. In a project, we do not only need to communicate with our teammates, but also our clients and many other agencies. The ability to convey the information as well as maintain a friendly relationship is crucial for the success of a project.

I already have taken many helpful lessons and experiences from this internship. And I am very thankful for everyone who has offered me help during this internship.