Senior Credit Research Analyst

at  Just Group

SKILLS AND KNOWLEDGE

• A generalist profile would be preferable; past coverage of any of the following sectors will also be seen as a strong positive: utilities (focus on UK-regulated electricity and gas and water), communication, industrial, consumer non-cyclical and financial
• Good knowledge of Bloomberg functions, including bond pricing, ratings, news alerts, portfolio set up and issuances
• Good knowledge of rating agencies’ approaches and ability to use their rating methodologies to perform internal ratings
• Understanding of bond prospectuses’ structures and ability to capture relevant information
• Accuracy, autonomy, attention to details, intellectual curiosity, strong verbal and writing skills and deliverability under tight deadlines are very valuable attributes to have in order to be successful in this function
• Team spirit and collaboration are essential
• Basic knowledge of the SII framework for insurers would be seen as a strong positive

EXPERIENCE

• 5 to 7 years in a full-time credit research position in a sell- or buy-side institution, such as a bank or an asset manager
• Either a publishing or non-publishing role, primary and secondary markets
• Strong focus on fundamental analysis
• Experience in structuring private assets and in contributing to enhancing deal structures

PURPOSE

Along with the Investment Team (Team), the Credit Research Function (CRF) has grown significantly in order to help deliver Just’s strategic and operational objectives. The Team is managing internally an increasing amount of public bonds, while at the same time on-boarding more external asset managers. The CRF is quite critical for asset deployment as it provides, inter alia, credit fundamental expertise for most assets in our portfolio, either internally- or externally managed.
The CRF was for a long time integrated in terms of public and private research, but going forward, the structure of the team will change, with a delineation between liquid and illiquid assets being introduced. As part of the strategic refresh of the Public Credit Research function within the CRF, a Senior Credit Research Analyst will be one of the more senior members of a team with a broad portfolio of assets to cover and considerable new business premia to invest each year.

JOB ROLE ACCOUNTABILITIES

Public Issuer Coverage

• Taking ownership of a coverage group of issuers, with responsibility for ongoing monitoring, including (among others) investment recommendations, credit notes and earnings updates
• Identifying and initiating coverage on issuers that are new to the portfolio, from an initial short-term recommendation through to a more comprehensive review within a defined time period
• Being assigned a number of sectors for which the senior analyst will be the specialist on within the team, including sector reviews, updates on relevant news and attending conferences or trainings to improve sector understanding
• Work closely with the broader investment team to proactively suggest trading opportunities whether they be focused around return enhancement, portfolio optimisation or credit mitigation
• Being a key stakeholder between the CRF and the Public Credit team who are responsible for liquid portfolio management
• Creating portfolio benchmarks to help suggest trade opportunities
• Occasionally working with the private assets team to share sector or issuer expertise in the context of illiquid asset transactions

Projects

• Take a role in projects across the business that require credit team involvement, whether originated from credit or requiring our input for other purposes (e.g. regulatory actions, investor relations, ALM)
• Being a point of contact within the investment team for other departments (e.g. risk, DB, actuarial) by maintaining relationships with other verticals and building a reputation for reliability and quality
• Writing and presenting papers on projects to relevant committees on updates, requests for approvals and general discussion, ensuring that materials produced are of high quality and in line with expectations of those committees
• Upgrading existing and creating new tools in order to enhance the credit research function ways of working

Mentoring

• Being a role model to other members of the credit team and the investment team more broadly, through attitudes and behaviours suiting a more senior member of the team, aligned with Just’s values
• Setting an example to more junior members of the team, including line management of graduate research analysts
• Providing training to credit research analysts and other team members

MI Production

• Oversee the production of regular MI and other resources used by the credit research team, including comprehensively understanding the process by which they are created, updated and refreshed, reviewing outputs produced by more junior members of the team, and leading relationships between credit research and the consumers of MI and other outputs that are created
• Take steps to improve processes where possible to ensure that outputs are robust, automated where possible, and of maximum use to end users
• Ensure that the quality of resources is in line with the expectations of the wider business