- Joined
- 2/21/10
- Messages
- 12
- Points
- 11
Hello,
I have read lots of advices on personal statement. By following these advices, I drafted my own one. I'm not confident about its quality. Please feel free to leave your comments or correct my draft. Any advice is welcomed. I'm really appreciated for your time and effort. My PS is listed as follows.
“Investment has certain risks, be wised with your decision.” It is the most popular caveat that warns/ suggests the retail investors when they open trading accounts for mutual funds or stock market. Although all investors have heard the caveat very often, most of them did not take it seriously and keep the caveat in mind until they suffered huge losses. Unfortunately, I was one of them.
Affected by the famous China Stock Mania in 2006 and 2007, in the second week of May 2007, I opened my first stock account and began to buy stocks with all my savings as a novice investor. In the following week, I obtained a 10 percent profit which made me experience the short-term sweetness of investment. Then it came with the bitterness brought by some accidental yet inevitable major events in China and global financial markets. On May 29th, 2007, Ministry of Finance of China announced a hike in the stamp tax on stock trading to 0.3 percent from 0.1 percent. Triggered by this announcement, Chinese stocks plummeted nearly seven percent on the following day and contracted dramatically in the following three months. Consequently, 30 percent of my principal was evaporated, which made me feel the pain of a bearish market. I felt even worse as I continued to struggle with the declining share price when U.S. subprime mortgage crisis emerged and spread to all corners of the world. In the worst case scenario, 80 percent of my principal was gone. Although China stock market rebounded slightly from recession after 2009, only 40 percent of my principal is left in my stock account. After going through all the exciting and frustrating moments, I start to pay high attention to and get deeper understanding of risks in the financial market.
In the Concise Oxford English Dictionary, risk is defined as “hazard, a chance of bad consequences, loss or exposure to mischance”. In financial market, it could be defined as “any event or action that may adversely affect an organization’s ability to achieve its objectives and execute its strategies” or “the quantifiable likelihood of loss or less-than-expected returns”. Risk in financial market can be divided into financial risk and nonfinancial risk. Financial risk refers to all risks derived from events in the external financial markets and includes market risk, credit risk, and liquidity risk. Nonfinancial risk refers to all other forms of risk, including operation risk, model risk, settlement risk, regulatory risk, legal risk, tax risk, and accounting risk. Both financial and nonfinancial risk must be managed properly otherwise huge loss would be incurred. In an effort to avoid the possible loss or achieve the highest possible level of reward for the risks incurred, risk management has been widely studied since 1955. And great progress has been made since then.
Although many sophisticated risk management techniques have been developed to measure the varying facets of risk and widely applied by financial companies and institutions, they do not fit the financial market perfectly, which has been proved by the numerous financial crises happened in the past 70 years. The root cause is that the explosion of complex instruments and rapid changes in the structure of financial markets can outpace the development of the risk management and processing and settlement infrastructure. The Great Financial Crisis of 2007-09 has revealed significant weaknesses in risk management practices across the financial services industry. Therefore, there is still much work to be done to improve the risk management methodologies and processes.
The MFE program at the XXX University is a perfect program for risk management in terms of course content, semester organization, and faculty configuration. The state-of-the-art, highly structured curriculums in risk management and financial management, mathematics and computational methods prepare students for careers that involve the quantitative financial analysis in the broadest sense. The three-session organization which includes a summer term for internship gives students enough time to learn theoretical knowledge, as well as exposure to real-work situations. The faculties, most of whom are either faculty members or professionals from financial institutions, give inspiring lectures on practical financial problems and provide important contacts with financial community. Therefore, to achieve my career goals in Finance industry, I would like to apply for the MFE program at XXX University. I believe that my background in Mathematics, Statistics, and Finance as well as my programming skills would make me well prepared for the further study in this program.
I have read lots of advices on personal statement. By following these advices, I drafted my own one. I'm not confident about its quality. Please feel free to leave your comments or correct my draft. Any advice is welcomed. I'm really appreciated for your time and effort. My PS is listed as follows.
“Investment has certain risks, be wised with your decision.” It is the most popular caveat that warns/ suggests the retail investors when they open trading accounts for mutual funds or stock market. Although all investors have heard the caveat very often, most of them did not take it seriously and keep the caveat in mind until they suffered huge losses. Unfortunately, I was one of them.
Affected by the famous China Stock Mania in 2006 and 2007, in the second week of May 2007, I opened my first stock account and began to buy stocks with all my savings as a novice investor. In the following week, I obtained a 10 percent profit which made me experience the short-term sweetness of investment. Then it came with the bitterness brought by some accidental yet inevitable major events in China and global financial markets. On May 29th, 2007, Ministry of Finance of China announced a hike in the stamp tax on stock trading to 0.3 percent from 0.1 percent. Triggered by this announcement, Chinese stocks plummeted nearly seven percent on the following day and contracted dramatically in the following three months. Consequently, 30 percent of my principal was evaporated, which made me feel the pain of a bearish market. I felt even worse as I continued to struggle with the declining share price when U.S. subprime mortgage crisis emerged and spread to all corners of the world. In the worst case scenario, 80 percent of my principal was gone. Although China stock market rebounded slightly from recession after 2009, only 40 percent of my principal is left in my stock account. After going through all the exciting and frustrating moments, I start to pay high attention to and get deeper understanding of risks in the financial market.
In the Concise Oxford English Dictionary, risk is defined as “hazard, a chance of bad consequences, loss or exposure to mischance”. In financial market, it could be defined as “any event or action that may adversely affect an organization’s ability to achieve its objectives and execute its strategies” or “the quantifiable likelihood of loss or less-than-expected returns”. Risk in financial market can be divided into financial risk and nonfinancial risk. Financial risk refers to all risks derived from events in the external financial markets and includes market risk, credit risk, and liquidity risk. Nonfinancial risk refers to all other forms of risk, including operation risk, model risk, settlement risk, regulatory risk, legal risk, tax risk, and accounting risk. Both financial and nonfinancial risk must be managed properly otherwise huge loss would be incurred. In an effort to avoid the possible loss or achieve the highest possible level of reward for the risks incurred, risk management has been widely studied since 1955. And great progress has been made since then.
Although many sophisticated risk management techniques have been developed to measure the varying facets of risk and widely applied by financial companies and institutions, they do not fit the financial market perfectly, which has been proved by the numerous financial crises happened in the past 70 years. The root cause is that the explosion of complex instruments and rapid changes in the structure of financial markets can outpace the development of the risk management and processing and settlement infrastructure. The Great Financial Crisis of 2007-09 has revealed significant weaknesses in risk management practices across the financial services industry. Therefore, there is still much work to be done to improve the risk management methodologies and processes.
The MFE program at the XXX University is a perfect program for risk management in terms of course content, semester organization, and faculty configuration. The state-of-the-art, highly structured curriculums in risk management and financial management, mathematics and computational methods prepare students for careers that involve the quantitative financial analysis in the broadest sense. The three-session organization which includes a summer term for internship gives students enough time to learn theoretical knowledge, as well as exposure to real-work situations. The faculties, most of whom are either faculty members or professionals from financial institutions, give inspiring lectures on practical financial problems and provide important contacts with financial community. Therefore, to achieve my career goals in Finance industry, I would like to apply for the MFE program at XXX University. I believe that my background in Mathematics, Statistics, and Finance as well as my programming skills would make me well prepared for the further study in this program.
It's not all that bad but it has lots of issues.
