Irritating Analyst

So yesterday began the annual eat-drink-and-make-merry week for the petroleum world, also known as APPEC. It happened the way it normally does, really, with serpents (double headed and otherwise) descending upon several nominated ballrooms across central Singapore, making ostentatious merry in true fat-cat fashion. For me, I went there to meet new people, gather intel and catch up with old friends.

That would be considered business as usual, and will not merit a post in itself. But I met this REALLY #&*^$(#&^#$ irritating analyst guy, and I simply had to blog about it. It started when I interrupted a 3-man group setting, initially intending to bug my friend to stop jabbering and leave for the next party, and to grab the other guy in the ballroom so we can set off for Raffles Hotel. As a matter of courtesy, my friend introduced me to the other 2 in the group, and this guy standing across from me introduced himself and launched into what-do-you-do questions, and when he found out that I was an analyst, he immediately sank his hooks in and started grilling me. Not satisfied that we were about 1 metre apart, he came over to stand beside me and started asking me about my view on the market AND EVERYTHING!!!

Now if you’ve never been an analyst, you probably won’t quite understand why I felt so violated. You see, to form a view, analysts such as I take huge amounts of data and crunch numbers all day. We try our best to extract information from our sources based on the goodwill that we’ve received over past interactions (this involves lots and lots of drinking sessions where I slowly but surely destroy my liver). People don’t simply give information like that. This market is completely opaque. My friend, a buy-side investment banker, pores through huge stacks of annual reports in order to make a single buy/sell/hold recommendation. Another guy studied 6 years for his PhD, and condensed his final thesis into a single A4 sized paper. Though clearly not of that calibre, I do still feel the pinch.

So that one view that we have, such as “crude is going to recover”, has, supporting it, copious amounts of S&D data, research work, hours of talking to people, many favours claimed. So you can expect my inner turmoil when he asked me questions about my view: Should I reply him so as to impress him and sound smart (I know the naturally neurotic part of me does)? Or should I tell him that I really don’t know, and “analyst” in my company is another name for glorified admin staff. Or should take the middle ground and just give him a shallow overview of what my real view is? This was the option I chose, and clearly, it was the wrong tack to take. Eventually I had to cut loss by quickly saying that I have to go say hi to someone else and running for dear life.

So this morning, to continue with the BBQ fest, he started the yahoo-grilling with this:

IA (irritating analyst): morning
IA: [Bank] FO guy
IA: how are you?

I of course replied with trite polite remarks [not the wisest move].

Me: Hi there.. Good.
Me: Was nice meeting you yesterday.

Move to establish contact,

IA: so do I
IA: lets keep in contact
Me: Sure.

…and we’re off

IA: before in [pretentious American bank], what were you doing?
Me: Before that I was in school..

I tried to turn the heat back on him, unsuccessfully.

Me: You? Before [huge oil major] what did you do?
IA: hahaha
IA: in [huge oil major] I was opearting gasoline cargoes and refinery supply planner

Because the scud missiles came right back.

IA: i meant in [pretentious American bank] what did you do?
Me: I was an analyst in [pretentious American bank].

I took the longest time possible to respond to his yahoos, and after a while, I decided to pull the plug on this conversation.

Me: Sorry for the delayed response. Quite busy.