Investment Analyst

Overview

Investment Analyst with Fundamental Research Associates Inc. in New York, NY

Responsibilities

• Analyze investment opportunities, research new investment strategies, and interpret and analyze complex financial data.
• Perform fundamental credit analysis, including economic and financial modeling, industry research, management analysis, and differentiated research in various sectors such as industrials and paper & packaging.
• Enhance knowledge of risk and portfolio oversight by leveraging the team’s understanding of risk and payoff profiles across instruments (corporates, converts, equity, options) and trade structures to express views, capture alpha, and manage risk.
• Apply modeling techniques for corporate capital structures and derivative pricing (options, credit derivatives), risk measurement/management, and performance attribution.
• Participate in and support the due diligence process of Credit Investment (CI) opportunities, identifying key merits and risks, meeting with management teams, and reviewing data-room documentation and third-party reports.
• Support and perform preliminary analysis of CI investments, including review of public information.
• Analyze existing credit documents and review equity, fixed income, and ratings reports.
• Develop and validate detailed financial models, including downside scenarios and reviewing projections.
• Undertake fundamental and quantitative analysis of various financial products, including reading analyst reports and scrutinizing complex financial documents and publications.
• Cover multiple CIs in a fast-paced environment requiring efficient evaluation of opportunities.
• Clearly identify and communicate investment advantages and risk scenarios for each investment.
• Proactively identify new investment opportunities to contribute to the business across trading strategies.
• Build financial models and make investment decisions in a risk-adjusted, probabilistic manner.

Location

Fundamental Research Associates Inc., 650 Fifth Avenue, 33rd Floor, New York, NY 10019

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree or foreign equivalent in Economics, Business Administration, or a closely related quantitative field.
• Two (2) years as a financial analyst, investment analyst, credit analyst, or a closely related position.
• Experience must include:
  • Utilizing operating memoranda and credit rating agency reports (Moody’s and S&P) to perform analyses of financial instruments;
  • Evaluating financing alternatives for companies, including secured, unsecured, and convertible instruments;
  • Transforming evaluations into client presentations;
  • Assembling debt comparables, equity comparables, and precedent transactions;
  • Executing in a lead advisory capacity the following M&A transactions (live deal): public-to-public M&A, private-company M&A, carve-out divestitures, and corporate break-up transactions;
  • Advisory pertaining to initial public offerings, and executing in a lead/“lead-left” capacity the following financing transactions (live deal): leveraged loan issuance and high-yield bond issuance;
  • Executing internal credit risk committee processes, including: preparing debt paydown models, incorporating financial scenarios, using market-implied rate expectations, responding to due diligence questions, and preparing memos for internal risk committees;
  • Performing industry coverage of the industrials sector, including live deal experience involving companies from the paper and packaging industry;
  • Creating and maintaining asset-level financial profiles, including mill assets, and using RISI to track commodity data (pulp & paper pricing at grade/hub level);
  • Leading coordination of deal execution work streams, including ratings agency and investor presentation drafting, CIM drafting, management presentation drafting, buyer models, site visits, and due diligence;
  • Modeling, analyzing, and conveying the financial and strategic merits of acquisitions to lenders;
  • Creating operating models for commodity-oriented businesses (pulp/paper/forestry products);
  • Creating models to measure credit risk, including liquidity risk, interest rate risk, and market risk;
  • Forecasting company performance under a range of variables (commodity price assumptions, cost structure, capital expenditure, capital structure), considering historical economic and industry trends;
  • Validating financial models, including checking assumptions, back-testing results, and evaluating model performance in real-time;
  • Refining and testing valuation models (discounted cash flow and leveraged buyout analyses) to improve accuracy and account for market variables.

Work Schedule & Compensation

Monday–Friday, 40 hours per week, $150,000 to $200,000 per year