Genus Capital Management is committed to initiatives aimed at developing the workforce of tomorrow. We believe the experience young professionals can get early on in their career is paramount to their future success.
Central to these initiatives is our internship program, allowing students to gain real-world experience working in our fast-paced environment, with guidance and insights given to the interns from many facets of our business.
Another one of our past interns, Ryleigh Bakker, shared her experiences working with Genus.
In Ryleigh Bakker's Words
I have such gratitude for my summer term at Genus Capital Management. It’s the relationships with caring colleagues that I value the most.
I came to Genus through an opportunity with Thomas Holloway, portfolio manager at Genus and finance professor at the University of Calgary. Having remembered my interest in graduate research, Tom proposed we work on a project this summer related to quantitative finance and the yield curve environment. We decided together that, with its 32 years of quantitative innovation, Genus would be the right fit for this kind of practitioner research. Alongside our research objectives, I also got to explore the investment management industry and engage with diverse teams and work functions.
Responsibilities and Experiences
One of my first and most interesting projects was publishing a comment letter for the Exposure Draft of the CFA Institute ESG Disclosure Standards for Investment Products. Through our time on this project, we researched the current state of the disclosure environment, closely reading the 58-page exposure draft and reviewing Genus’ previous comments on the original Consultation paper. I learned so much about the global ESG environment and the future of disclosures during the research and writing of our comment letter, especially in the space of sustainability and impact. This learning was invaluable and will continue to be highly relevant as the investment world prioritizes ESG responsibility and ethical capital allocation.
I had the opportunity to work across many teams at Genus, learning from my colleagues in marketing, research, digital wealth management, Impact/ESG, and risk analysis. The diversity of my tasks, from testing the digital wealth management portal, to analyzing and presenting key fund risk metrics, all contributed to my enriched understanding of the portfolio management industry.
Learning & Collaboration
Throughout the summer, our research remained a key focus. With Tom’s guidance, I read current literature on quantitative finance and explored the existing body of research in regards to yield in a quantitative context. I had the incredible opportunity to present our literature review and proposed research questions to our internal Genus research team. Our work on the topic led to the research, execution, and publication of a 12-page paper on the topic of employing a yield variable as a quantitative factor in mapping individual security returns. Our publication of this paper was a highlight of the summer and it was so exciting to see our summer’s work reflected in a published, shareable document.
Working at Genus Capital on challenging projects and learning across a wide variety of topics all contributed to my incredibly positive experience this summer. I am so grateful for the relationships I have developed through my time at Genus, and look forward to following Genus over this next year and to staying in touch with my wonderful colleagues. Thank you to Genus Capital, to the Mitacs Business Strategy Internship program, and to the University of Calgary for making this experience possible. A special thank you to Thomas Holloway, who supported me every step of the way this summer and who was instrumental in our final work project – specifically, creating a published quantitative finance article that we are both proud and excited to share.
