Robert Walters
Rates Trade Assistant

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Rates Trading Assistant
A leading global financial institution is seeking a Senior Rates Trading Assistant to join their London-based team within the Global Middle Office. This role offers you the opportunity to work closely with Capital Markets Trading & Sales, Product Operations, and other key stakeholders, supporting international rates trading activities that require specialised handling and in-depth product knowledge.
You will be instrumental in introducing new products, technologies, and processes, ensuring operational excellence and regulatory compliance. The organisation values flexibility, professional growth, and a supportive workplace culture where your expertise will be recognised and nurtured. If you are looking for a role that combines technical skill with collaborative teamwork and offers exposure to complex financial products, this is an exceptional opportunity to advance your career.
What you'll do:
- Execute assigned on-desk trade support activities efficiently and accurately for international rates trading operations.
- Book, validate, amend, affirm, and allocate trades using MarkitWire, Calypso, and TOMs systems while maintaining meticulous attention to detail.
- Review trade discrepancies thoroughly and conduct investigations to resolve issues promptly.
- Perform comprehensive trade and position reconciliations to ensure accuracy across all transactions.
- Investigate PnL and booking issues with diligence, escalating matters as required to management for resolution.
- Conduct brokerage checks and handle any ad hoc requests from the trading desk with responsiveness and reliability.
- Support the resolution of exceptions by collaborating with internal teams and escalating when necessary.
- Participate actively in stakeholder forums such as Project Delivery, Technology, Regulatory, and Risk to support Rates Trade Support activities.
- Compile risk metrics for management reporting purposes and contribute to contingency planning efforts.
- Identify potential risk situations within Rates Trade Support activities and ensure adherence to directives, internal processes, approvals, regulatory requirements, and market best practice guidelines.
Reasons to use Rodeo
I’m in my final year doing Economics and I don’t know whether to apply for grad schemes now or do a masters first. What do you think?
Honest answer — it depends on where you want to end up. A lot of top grad schemes (Big 4, civil service, banking) don’t need a masters. Let’s look at the ones you’d be competitive for now, and we can decide if a masters actually adds anything.
Also worth knowing: most autumn 2026 applications are open now. Timing matters more than you think.
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Graduate Consultant — 2026 Scheme
Why you're a good match
StrongYour economics background and your summer at a regional bank line up with what PwC looks for on the consulting scheme. Applications close in four weeks.
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Every day your agent scans the market matching roles against what actually matters to you, not just keywords on a CV.
Why you're a good match
You’ve got the grades and the economics background, and your bank internship is exactly the experience this scheme looks for. Apply soon — deadlines close within the month.
Experience fit
Your summer at the bank plus your econometrics coursework map directly to the day-one responsibilities on this scheme — client modelling, market briefings, and deal support.
Only hits
No noise. No "maybe this fits." Just roles with a clear explanation of why they're right — and where to focus when applying.
What you bring:
- Extensive experience supporting rates or structured interest rates trading desks within a financial institution is essential for this role.
- A university degree in a related discipline provides the foundational knowledge required for success.
- Strong understanding of financial products including interest rate swaps, inflation swaps, cross currency swaps, bonds, futures, options, fras as well as structured rates products is vital.
- Expert knowledge of MarkitWire and Calypso systems with extensive experience building non-standard trades including modelling trades for pricing is highly desirable.
- Ability to calculate swap notional given risk and tenor along with hedge ratios demonstrates advanced analytical skills.
- Familiarity with OIS compounding rate calculation aids in investigating rate discrepancies effectively.
- Experience with trade pricing including asset swaps, butterflies, spreads enables you to sanity check broker trades confidently.
- Proven track record in trade compressions processing including risk checks showcases your attention to detail.
- Experience of SwapAgent is advantageous for supporting complex transactions.
- Advanced data handling skills particularly in Excel/VBA, Power BI and preferably Python are required for building spreadsheets that handle large amounts of data for reconciliations or trade analysis.


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