50 students who will be the top global bankers of tomorrow
Not all bankers are made equal. Some go to target universities, have perfect credentials, and are athletic supermen and women. These people usually have excellent leadership qualities, and if they’re interested in finance from an early age (as they should be), they’re likely climbing the ranks – or have already climbed them – of their local finance societies.
But who are these ideal candidates? Well, luckily for you, we’ve compiled a list of 50 of them from across the world. Below is our definitive(-ish) list of the students who will be top bankers in 2030, based on the current heads of all the top finance societies at all the top schools. ✨✨✨
We’re kicking off this top 50 with two people with surprisingly similar profiles – Asher Noel and Patrick Rak, co-presidents of the Harvard Financial Analysts Club. Both co-Presidents were part of hedge fund Point72’s winter academy (more about that here). Both were the top students at their respective high schools in Illinois and Massachusetts. Rak probably edges Noel on sheer experience, with seven internships under his belt.
Representing MIT is Adalberto Rinaldi, an MFin student. Rinaldi is a Michigan grad and veritable athlete, having played as a wide receiver for the school and, before that, getting a splattering of podiums in European rowing competitions. Rinaldi was with Evercore over the summer and was a private equity intern for Green Arrow Capital in Rome (the Italian one) before that.
Stanford’s Carolyn Ky is our next entry. A master’s student, Ky also has a chunk of internships under her belt – data analysis at Boeing, strategy consulting at Artemis Connection, and investment banking at Centerview Partners. At Stanford, she was the culture night director for the Vietnamese society and… President of the finance society.
Briefly leaving the United States, we find Oxford University’s Georgi Nedyalkov. Nedyalkov, from Bulgaria, is a chemistry student; and a damn good one, having competed in four international chemistry Olympiads, winning 3 medals for the national team (bronze, mind you). He interned with DSK Bank’s sales and trading desk back in 2021, as well as Cerberus, the private equity fund, in 2023.
We touchdown back in Chicago and Justin Feng. Feng is president of the Blue Chips, Chicago’s investment club, which manages a $150k portfolio. He’s also due to start with Morgan Stanley when he graduates, in the global technology group.
Back across the Atlantic is Vanessa Chen, president of Cambridge’s Investment Banking Society (Cambridge’s most active finance society, don’t you know), and Vice President of the university’s real estate finance and investing society (Cambridge’s largest real estate society, don’t you know). Chen interned with Blackstone this summer (which has a 0.25% acceptance rate, by the way).
Also in London is Amandeep Nagra. Nagra, chairman of LSE’s Business and Investment Group, has the sort of academic success that people make up for fictional character biographies; 10 grade 9’s at GCSE, 5 A*s at A-Level. That means averaging over 90% in every single module taken from the age of 16. No wonder he got the LSE100 award.
Moving out of London, but without surrendering an inch of academic excellence, is Wharton, and two undergraduates: Gizem Bilen and Junbin Huang. Co-presidents of the undergraduate finance club, Huang is an analyst-in-waiting at Blackstone (again, 0.25% acceptance rate), whilst Bilen interned with Nomura this summer and PEI global partners last year. A once-resident of Istanbul, Blien also has experience at Bloomberg and Four Seasons (the hotel chain) in the city.
Next up are the Berkeley duo of Yujin Kim and Eaton Sia. The two are co-Presidents of the Berkeley finance club, and did their schooling in Hong Kong and the Philippines respectively. Kim interned at JPMorgan over the summer; Sia at Bank of America. Kim is a rugby girl; Eaton is a debate club guy.
At NYU we find Delvia Zhang and Raghul Ravindranathan, co-presidents of the school’s finance society. Zhang, who spent the summer interning for BofA’s M&A group, also interned for the bank last year, in the global industrials team. She also found time, somehow, to intern for Boston Consulting Group’s energy team in between those two. Oh, and she’s on the dean’s list. Nice. Ravindranathan, meanwhile, went over to California to intern for boutique bank Centerview’s tech M&A team.
Also in New York, we have Columbia University’s Megan McGregor and Sean Salamante. The juniors are co-Presidents of the university’s Financial Investment Group (CFIG). McGregor, an art aficionado from Miami, interned for BlackRock and is due to start with the asset manager’s corporate communications team after graduation. Salamante, meanwhile, interned with BofA’s TMT team.
Not quite as young as the others (but presumably just as spritely) is London Business School’s Punit Malik. Malik, a former geologist (among others) for Shell, interned at Morgan Stanley (as an associate) over the summer. He’s also a father – having completed his first year at LBS during the process of becoming one (well, the bit after becoming one).
Next up is Siddharth Jain, president of the Yale Student Investment Group. Jain interned with hedge fund Citadel’s global fixed income team over the summer, and is co-founder of TeleHealth access for seniors, a nonprofit that helps senior citizens and those from low-income communities connect with doctors via TeleHealth. Over 600 people have volunteered for the project, donating 3,800 devices, and the team has raised $300k in the process.
We jet off for the first time (and not the last) to Asia, and more specifically Singapore, for William Huang, the president of the National University of Singapore’s Investment Society. Huang interned for global boutique Evercore last year, and regional giant OCBC the year before that. And regional boutique Bayfront Capital Advisors the year before that. By our expert calculations, he should be interning for a bulge bracket this year, and something intergalactic next year.
Canada is our next destination, for the University of Toronto’s very own Thomas Vissotto Aalbers and Oscar Zhao. Aalbers, who did his high schooling in Brazil, is also the founder of the investment banking club along with Zhao (they are currently co-Presidents).
Somewhere with much nicer weather (sorry, Canada) is California, where we find Melissa Chen, the president of Bruin Value Investing – which, in spite of its name, isn’t a penny-stock peddler but actually UCLA’s undergrad finance “organization” and investment fund. Chen interned with Morgan Stanley’s global power and utilities IB team this summer, and Credit Suisse’s financial sponsors team last summer.
Filippo Caretti is up next. Former president of Bocconi’s student finance society, he’s now an MFin student at MIT Sloan. He’s also a member of “A+ Trading Group”, a “closed group of retail investors” focused on “development and sharing of investment ideas”.
Also from mainland Europe is Hugo Blondeau, president of banking partnerships for ESCP HEC finance club. He spent this summer at BNP Paribas and is part of both HEC’s rugby XV and automobile club. Talk about a renaissance man.
Back to London for Angelin Roy, Imperial College London’s finance society chief. Roy has a veritable smorgasbord of experience, starting with Baker McKenzie (the law firm) in Bahrain, L’Oreal (the beauty brand), Deloitte (the big four firm), and most recently BNP Paribas’ trading desk. Good choices – especially BNP.
Leaving London takes us to the University of Manchester and Priyam Singh Vardhan, president of the finance society. Having interned with big four firm EY last year, Vardhan has been working at Nationwide, a British building society, in credit risk as part of a degree.
Also in Singapore is Yi Hng Quek, chairman of the NBS banking and finance club. After a Credit Suisse wealth management internship, Quek switched to a UBS summer analyst role. Good choice, especially given recent news.
We’re back stateside for Princeton University’s Eli Soffer and Erica Hsueh. Both, incidentally, spent the summer interning at Weiss Asset Management, an investment management firm based in Boston. Whilst Soffer was involved in muti-strategy investing during his internship (which operates a number of hedge funds), it’s unclear what Husueh was doing – although, based on her previous internships with Amazon’s engineering teams, it was probably more back office than front.
We then have Baha Kharoofa. Kharoofa is a bit like a protagonist in a Bethesda RPG, managing to simultaneously be his high school’s robotics club president and medical club president. He even did an internship at an Illinois medical manufacturer whilst still a teenager – wasn’t just a phase. Anyway, as well paid as doctors in the USA are, Kharoofa chose wisely and is now co-President of “Banking at Michigan”, the university’s investment banking society.
Back in New York (the state) is Joshua Figueroa, of Cornell University. Another academic megamind, Figueroa is not only the finance club’s president, but also CIO of a minority student-owned investment fund called “BlackGen Capital”, as well as being a D.E. Shaw Latitude Fellow, Dyson Scholar, and the likes. Figueroa is currently an analyst for Evercore.
Mudit Sanklecha, of Northwestern University, is next on the list. Sanklecha is, apart from his co-heading of the finance club, especially experienced in private equity; aside from an internship at M3 Capital Partners last year, he spent this summer with Blackstone’s real estate team. If you missed it above, Blackstone accepts just 0.25% of applicants to its grad scheme.
North of Chicago and pretty far west is Edison Huang of the University of British Columbia. Aside from being president of the university’s finance association, Huang is a member of its table tennis team and real estate club. More curiously, he was the MVP of both his high school’s basketball and table tennis team. Hard to imagine the overlap, but there you go.
All the way back in Europe we have INSEAD’s Luca Gerardo. Gerardo, who left Bonocci for INSEAD last year, left INSEAD private equity in Paris last week. Curiously, aside from private equity in Paris, he’s also dabbled in management consulting in Milan, financial control in Amsterdam, and fundraising in Monaco. Mr. Worldwide.
We’re back in Hong Kong one more time for Goodness Nwokike, chairwoman of the economics and finance society at the University of Hong Kong. Nwokike is, understatedly, a pretty decent handball player, having represented Hong Kong in the national youth games in the PRC.
Over in Texas is Jackson Osteen of the University of Texas at Austin. Osteen, despite heading up Texas University’s Finance Association, seems to enjoy his time more in lawmaking, having spent four months last year as a legislative fellow for the House of Representatives, and four this year interning in the Senate. Embrace your calling, Jackson.
In Hong Kong again is Lam Lok Tin, chairman of the… Deep breath… Finance Student’s Society, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology’s Student Union. More interestingly, Lam was, last year, an institutional fintech sales intern for Privé Technologies, itself a fintech, and a summer intern this year for the Hong Kong stock exchange’s emerging business & FIC team.
In North Carolina, meanwhile, is Junwoo Kang, of Duke University. A basketball fan and poker player, Kang is also the CEO of the Duke investment club (and president of Scale and Coin, the business society, before that). Kang interned at Madison Avenue Partners, a New York hedge fund, last year. He’s due to join them when he graduates.
From Warwick is Kaspar Lee, former chairman of the Warwick finance societies and freshly-started UBS global markets quant. Lee is, like most quants, a multi-disciplinarian, with software, data, and quantitative internships under his belt from Capgemini and Blackrock, among others.
Representing Erasmus University Rotterdam is Noah Van Roekel, of the financial study association. Van Roekel has had an interesting story; from working as a bike mechanic and kitchen porter, to being a security guard at sports events, to consulting for Eden McCallum, the management consultant.
The only trip to Switzerland, and Zurich more specifically, is for Nicola Peter, of UZH’s finance club. Peter, the umpteenth EY former intern on the list, also spent six months with Morgan Stanley investment banking team in the city.
Our last trip to Hong Kong, meanwhile, is for Sally Ng, of the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Ng, who earned a full scholarship to the university, is according to the Strategic Investment Society, “a huge football fan”, and of both the Argentinian and French national teams. A difficult world cup for some.
The last American on the list is Nicholas Fields of SoCal. Co-President of the Trojan Investment Society, the school’s undergraduate finance club. Fields, a veteran investment banking and private equity intern (four months each), seems to have made up on the route he’s set on, starting another internship with Solomon Partners’ investment banking team next year.
Valeriya Tektel, of the University of Edinburgh, heads the school’s student-run investment fund; at £79k, it’s the largest in the UK. Tektel was a Goldman Sachs TMT M&A intern this summer, and has previously interned at KPMG. Good choice.
Singapore Management University’s Sirui Liu is next on the list. A quantitative finance major and president of the university’s quantitative finance society, Liu was a Platoon Sargeant in the Singaporean Armed Forces and is currently a group risk intern at Clifford Capital Holdings, a specialist finance provider.
Nearly last on our list is Barak Azor, of Tilburg University. A former developer, current content creator, and portfolio manager (for the student-run fund), Azor is also co-founder of BSQuizlet, a tutoring platform for undergraduate students.
The University of Bath’s students run an investment club – SOBIC – headed up by a certain Harry Spencer. Spencer, who interned at investment manager PIMCO over the summer (fresh off the back of a year-long JPMorgan industrial placement), is also reginal representative for AmplifyME, a finance simulator.
Also worth mentioning is Omar Kamaladin of King’s College London. Kamaladin is another serial overachiever, a list staple; three spring internships last year (at pretty prestigious destinations - Jefferies, Rothschild, and PJT) somehow converted themselves into a (converted) JPMorgan summer placement with the industrials team. Kamaladin also, bizarrely, finds time to be chairman or president of four separate societies: the Energy, Hedge Fund, M&A, and banking & finance societies. You’d imagine he would have done two summer internships if they didn’t have time overlaps, too.
Our last British student is Sasha Radford of the University of Bristol, just down the road from Bath. Radford, a politics & international relations student who interned at Raymond James over the summer, was also an ambassador for GAIN (which stands for “Girls Are Investors”) for over a year. GAIN is a charity that tackling the lack of female representation in investment management.
The remarkably named Silvère Preißendörfer-Charrier is our first German on the list. The president of the impeccably dressed (see below) finance society of WHU. Preißendörfer-Charrier somehow managed to intern at two boutique banks over the summer; regional players WTS Advisory and Saxenhammer.
Rounding off our list is another German: Simon Herrmann of the Frankfurt School of Management and Finance, chief of FS Invest, the official student-run investment club. Herrmann, tragically, only managed one internship this summer. Luckily, it was at BNP Paribas, an investment bank that’s been doing pretty well recently. He also spent some time at EY last year.
The WHU Finance Society manifesting their futures
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