I don’t think you can really get a front-office role without having a formal university degree (if that’s what you’re saying – it’s a bit unclear from your comment).

So I would tell you to get the full-time university degree first and then worry about internship and full-time recruiting for front-office roles during the degree.

If you cannot do that and can only do it part-time, all you can really do is keep working and push for transfers into more relevant groups. Maybe think about smaller/outside firms and work there while doing the degree if they give you more relevant work (e.g., an independent valuation firm or something similar rather than a large bank).

Apologies for the upcoming essay-like comment….

I am currently an apprentice (1 year contract) at one of the big 4 investment banks and I do not hold a degree (planning to pursue it part-time this year). I am gunning to get converted into a full-time role coming the end of my contract.

My long term goal is to work in a client-facing role however, it is difficult to break into the front-office dream while I’m an apprentice in the back-office (risk/ regulatory). I have spoken to several senior stakeholders and they have all encouraged me to interview for internal transfer roles to hopefully a middle-office analyst or a client service analyst (back-office)

What do you think should be my next step? Greatly appreciate it and I enjoy your content very much :)

Have fun! Warning: the 2nd half of the game is much harder with these mods. I had to try some boss battles 3-4x to win, and I’ve played the base game many times.

I was totally unaware of rom mods for FF6, that is a HUGE find!

Thank you kind sir.

So, if you’ve already played all the classics from the 80s, 90s, 00s, etc., I don’t have too much to add. I would also put a few other games on your list, like Lufia 2, Earthbound, and some of the older Dragon Quest games that were not originally released in the west (Dragon Quest 5 from 1992 is one of the best in the series – available on iOS and Android now).

Also, Mother 3, which is confusingly the sequel to Earthbound, which was “Mother 2” in Japan (fan translation available). If you like action RPGs, Soul Blazer, Illusion of Gaia, and Terranigma (the last was never officially released in North America).

There are also quite a few PS1 games worth including, even outside of the FF series, such as Suikoden 2, Xenogears, Wild Arms, and Star Ocean 2.

I guess my main recommendation is to check out some of the recent hacks and mods for these games that improve/modernize the gameplay and the graphics. Specifically:

FF6 – Brave New World and T-Edition (fix many gameplay issues, much harder battles, and extra story and side quests in T-Edition)
FF7 – Satsuki Yatoshi mod (graphics) and New Threat (more difficult gameplay, alternate story/events)
FF9 – Moguri mod for AI-upscaled graphics and Alternate Fantasy for added story/events/characters

There are more if you look on Reddit, these are just a few I’ve played recently.

Thanks for your support, but I don’t think you need to check every day – I publish at most one article per week, and only occasionally on current events/markets.

I will write an investment/market update in January. Besides that, it really depends on what’s happening worldwide. There was a lot to write about in years like 2008, 2020, and even 2016, but many of the years in between were fairly boring.

To be honest, I’m kind of exhausted writing/hearing about pandemic-related topics. Covid has become a religion for many people, and no matter what data/evidence you present, everyone has their views set in stone, and nothing will ever change until 5-10+ years pass and everyone can look back and do a full evaluation. It’s also clear that most people in tech/finance disagree with my views of what has happened so far, so…

If I had to give a single recommendation for something within the past 1-2 years, it would be Yakuza: Like a Dragon.”

I’m into old RPG’s/narrative driven games, any recommendations here? I played Super Mario RPG, Chrono Trigger, All of the NES & SNES Final Fantasy games, etc…

https://mergersandinquisitions.com/pandemic-updates-2021/

Any chance you have one of these in the works for 2022?

No.