Week of July 10th

July 10th 2006

Greeting from Tokyo:

Today I was assigned a bit more challenging project. It is a credit report like the others, but it is not necessarily just a standard review. We don’t do a whole lot with the company, so the margins are not that high, the risk is not that high, but I get to assign the rating by myself. Of course before it is submitted my boss, Thomas, will look over the whole thing and make sure it is okay like all the rest, but this time, he said I should find out what the rating I felt was warranted by the company. This feels like a significant increase in responsibility. I feel very grateful that they are very concerned in seeing me progress. Thomas has been particularly helpful, and I think that he hopes just a little bit that I would come back for full time work.

I started by getting all the relevant information. I started with Bloomberg: major news stories over the last year, plots of equity price and other securities issued by the company: information on their credit rating. Next I got the Moody’s/S&P/Fitch rating analysis off the web. I guess a lot of my opinion will probably match what they say on their reports. Normally I guess a credit officer would us the ratings to determine if there was consensus, not as a basis of his report, but I’m not really a credit officer. Finally, I got the annual report and spread their financials. Just getting, and going through all the information took the better part of the day, so I guess I will start my analysis tomorrow.

July 11th 2006

Brad got back today. His brother’s wedding went well, but his grandfather passed away the same weekend, so he is going back the day after tomorrow to see to the funeral things. Not much has changed with the things I was doing with Brad. I am still trying to get a hold of Hondo-san to set-up a time to go over the OR-Loss numbers. Other than that, I am mostly just involved in projects that I have from CRM.

Since Brad is going back so soon, I guess my stay in CRM has been extended another week.

Update on the external receptions. I have been going, but not staying very long. They are interesting, but I don’t think that I will try and break into another firm. I know that my work in the bank, should I pursue a career in banking will only be temporary. I also have an a forming opinion that DB might be the best place to work. So I think that I’m not going to really press very hard to get into another company. I don’t know how hard I will press to get in here either, but that remains a decision to be seen.

July 12th 2006

Today’s lunch and learn was from Bill McIntyre. He is a member that used to be the Bishop of the 3rd ward. He works for Franklin Covey and gave a talk about the 7 Habits. I liked his presentation.

I turned in my credit analysis to Thomas today. He seemed to like it. I think that I did a pretty good job. He didn’t give me feedback by the time I left, but I assume I’ll have it on my desk tomorrow morning. I would have to say that it was with some great pleasure that I turned it in. I felt like I had finished a good report and things were going well. Overall, a good day.

July 13th 2006

Today was more of the same things. The report was accepted by Thomas. I ended up giving the company a AA- rating. Pretty good, it was in line with two of the reporting agencies and not very different from the year before, but it was one that I came up with.

I also met with Hondo-san today. She seemed a little worried that I was going to blame her for some of the problems we found in the numbers. She was also fairly glad to see that someone was actually looking at the numbers that she made. I guess her team is pretty small, and they must feel a bit left out of things. I guess she thought that Brad was ignoring her.

She also was treating me like I was someone who was in a position of larger influence that my simple intern self. I presented her what I thought was the problem and what the solution should be. I think we had a good understanding of each other. We both agreed that we should move to fix the problem. Although Brad wasn’t there, I think the meeting went well, and the information moved along well.

July 14th 2006

Today’s Lunch and Learn was with a guy from ECM named Guillaume Sakuma. I liked his style of speech, his candor, and the way he thought about things and then delivered good answers to questions that we had. Although he didn’t have anything to present, no slides, no handouts, he provided a very good overview. Two Lunch and Learns in a week. Good stuff.

Well, Hondo-san and her boss have gotten going on the OR-Loss thing. Hondo-san’s boss, Honma-san contacted the FSA and asked them what we should do about it. I hope that Brad is okay with all of this. I’ve been forwarding the emails, but no response really to anything. I know I can’t really expect feedback while he is attending to funeral arrangements, and I won’t call him unless there are troubles, but I am a bit worried. I guess they know what they are doing out there in the controlling, and we just have to trust that.

I guess Brad doesn’t, because he sent a message today saying that we shouldn’t go to the FSA before Mitch and Bret were brought into the loop. I wish this message could have gone to Honma-san yesterday. I hope that it wasn’t my fault they rushed to the FSA. Hondo-san called and asked if I thought that we should find out how to re-submit the information. I had assumed she meant that we should ask someone in the Bank. I didn’t realize she might have meant going to the FSA. Well, this issue just got a little bigger. Not that the issue got bigger, but the internal things going on with this got bigger. I hope it doesn’t turn into a problem for Brad with Bret and Mitch.