How would you describe your experience as an intern?
I would describe the Citadel internship as empowering.
In general, what did you like about the work you got to do?
The internship gave me a taste of what it’s like to be a real associate. I felt like my work was value-additive to the team because I was doing research on and building infrastructure for stocks that they didn’t already cover but wanted to pick up over time.
On each of my two rotations in the fundamental equities businesses, I pitched a stock that the team was interested in covering. I built a model from scratch with earnings projections and a valuation framework, and I also did deep fundamental research to build a thesis around whether I thought the stock was a long or a short. At the end of the rotation, I pitched my idea to the team, who then asked questions and shared feedback. I enjoyed my experience more than I ever expected.
What else did you learn?
For my consumer rotation, I initiated coverage on a food company. Even though the product itself was intuitive to me, it was still a challenge to learn the KPIs, what investors care about and how to flow that into my investment thesis and model. I enjoyed working with an analyst and team that took the time to mentor me, especially since they are among the best investors in the space.
My second rotation was within health care, which was less intuitive to me. I covered a medical device company that solved a problem for a population with a disease that I had no familiarity with.
While the business model itself was simple, I had to learn the intricacies of industry pricing, the underlying disease and sales distribution. This experience taught me how to break down a seemingly complicated topic into its fundamental building blocks, which I have found to be very transferable as a full-time associate today.
