Friday, September 19, 2008

The lowest level of Wall Street Food Chain

ON the subway, a stranger in a suit knowingly eyed my Lehman Brothers ID badge in its Bear Stearns holster. With a look of detached curiosity, he expressed his condolences. This is not the way I thought my Wall Street career would begin.

During college, I was an intern at Bear Stearns. There, I toiled at the lowest levels of Wall Street, fetching coffee, moving boxes, filing papers.
In my final summer at Bear, I was promoted to intern in the marketing department of the asset management division. There, I worked on some hedge funds that invested in stuff called "mortgage-backed securities."
Several months later, the hedge funds went down the tubes, dragging Bear Stearns behind them.
After I graduated from college, Lehman Brothers hired me to help settle trades in complex derivatives, the very derivatives that led to the company's demise. I helped resolve trading issues involving tens — hundreds — of millions of dollars.
And now? Now from my 

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