My Story – Frank Cahill

Hi there! my name is Frank Cahill, a Connecticut born, New Yorker at heart, who spent the previous 11 years of my career trading the global financial markets for investment banks and a hedge fund. I’ve decided to take some time out and revert to one of my first passions – teaching. Now given the a large majority of my life has been spent on the trading floors of large investment banks like HSBC and Goldman Sachs, I felt I was best equipped to combine my desire to teach and my core skill sets  – the financial markets. So the idea behind this bi-monthly blog is to give something back – to give my insights, education and experience from the past 11 years in the financial markets. To take that hopefully helpful insight I have gained and write a user friendly blog on what has happened in the markets over the previous 2 weeks. Present it in a simple and concise manner and in a format everyone can understand – you don’t have to have traded for HSBC or Goldman Sachs to enjoy and understand its content. So much of the financial markets need to be demystified for the masses and believe me it can be done and done very simply. 

Ok…….. so before we dive right in, I thought it best in this article to give you a brief bio of my financial markets career to date. By doing this I am hoping to give you a further insight into Frank Cahill the person and also potentially lend a small piece of credibility to my future insights and blogs. I hope having survived the tough trading environments of HSBC and Goldman Sachs for over a decade and learnt a lot about the financial markets, I will be in position to pass on some useful information to you guys.

So where did it all begin and how do this former Goldman Sachs trader end up writing a blog? I was born in the US, in Connecticut. From the small town of Ellington, the bright lights of NYC were never too far away – even if it was just from the parents that made the daily commute to Wall Street. My undergraduate was always going to have a financial background, as from an early age my desire to trade in the city was present – my Dad, also Frank, had run a small brokerage house in NYC. I was lucky enough to be accepted to Cornell SC Johnson College of Business, where I studied economics and finance. I spent the whole of the first semester perfecting my application to Goldman Sachs Summer Internship program and thankful it paid off. I had applied to all the usual suspects on Wall Street, but it was Goldman Sachs I really wanted and I worked my butt off that summer on the program, absorbing everything I could along the way. 

Following a very enjoyable post-graduate stint in London, which ultimately led to my return to that great city in 2014 with HSBC, I finally had a dream job with Goldman, successfully securing a place on the analyst program in NY. This former wannabe trader had finally accomplished his goal and following a rotation around the asset classes of FICC – I found myself in the Foreign Exchange Department, trading FX Vol. GS was all it had been in my head and more and this former bedroom trader was now playing in the big boy’s game. The Goldman Sachs trading floor was a fierce environment and standards were kept to the highest. I loved my time at Goldman Sachs and it made me the trader I am today. My education there was unrivalled and in 2014 I was left with a very difficult decision to make. HSBC had made me an offer I could not refuse – from both a career and personal perspective and this former Goldman Sachs lifer made the move across the Atlantic firstly and then onto Hong Kong to run their desk in Asia. Three fun filled years abroad really broadened my horizon away from Goldman Sachs and HSBC gave me the freedom to run my own desk and in my way. The circle was completed with HSBC when I made the move back home to NY to run the FX Vol desk in the States. 

Having spent over a decade trading for large corporate style banks in Goldman Sachs and HSBC, it was time for this former franchise trader to make the move to the dark side and step into the world of the hedge fund. Crest Global Partners and the bright lights of Asia was my calling. Frank Cahill the trader never looked back, but Frank Cahill the person need so time out – so at the beginning of 2019 I took a step back from the pressure of trading and have looked to explore over interest for the next 18 months. I know the trading floor will lure me back but in the interim period I am looking to explore opportunities like this blog.

I hope that gives you a little insight into my career so far and hopefully entices you into coming back for more once my blog is up and running . I hope you enjoy it and watch this space – Cheers, Frank Cahill.