Research Assistant - Structured Finance - ABS

Standard & Poor's, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies, is the world's foremost provider of independent credit ratings, indices, risk evaluation, investment research, data and valuations. An essential part of the world's financial infrastructure, Standard & Poor's has played a leading role for more than 140 years in providing investors with the independent benchmarks they need to feel more confident about their investment and financial decisions. And we do it with the utmost integrity. If our values speak to you, then speak to us.



Function:



The Research Assistant will work in conjunction with the analytical teams to prepare documents and presentations for Rating and Issuer Committee meetings and surveillance activities. Under limited supervision, the Research Assistant will generate and input appropriate financial and economic data from/to PC Mainframe databases, retrieve source documents, work with financial models, handle research projects which require planning, and update ratings data. In addition, the Research Assistant will contact issuers to obtain information needed for credit reviews and reports, attend meetings when appropriate with rated issuers and attend Ratings Committee meetings with industry experts and answer questions about financial spreadsheets.


A Research Assistant working under the guidance of a Project Lead or Analytical Managers performs the following functions:Analyze the collateral, cash flow and structure of ABS securities; Assemble data in accordance with established processes and procedures to the rating committee with recommendations; Assist in the collection and analysis of data on special projects dealing with a wide range of issues relating to the industry and criteria development Managing account additions and program amendments for high profile/frequent issuer and other issuer accounts. Providing credit/cash flow support to analysts responsible for rating new offerings issued by any of these accounts. General responsibilities on ABS Explorer- Verify calculations, clean up and update performance data in SFSS, perform follow-up steps with outstanding, unresolved issues Collect data and update auto loan industry loss curves Provide credit estimates on non-rated tranches in manufacturing housing deals Project cumulative gross defaults for alternative student loans using origination and securitized static pools Prepare PowerPoint presentation materials for conferences, seminars, trainings, and presentations



The Research Assistant is a non-exempt position.

*This is a guild represented position

REQUIREMENTS


Bachelor's degree
Overall GPA of 3.3
Microsoft Word Skills
Microsoft PowerPoint
Microsoft Excel Skills
Microsoft Access a plus
Cash flow analysis
Understanding the relationship between an income statement and balance sheet
Analytical ability
Attention to detail is a must
The ability to work in a team environment and produce quality work individually