Hogtown Lotuslander

The morning after SPD ("St. Patrick's Day") ... Er, better make that "the afternoon" after SPD :)

Yep, after the spirited celebrations of SPD, no one was gonna be up in the morning after. It would take all their energy just to get up in the afternoon.

However, some hardy souls did get up earlier than they would have liked in order to make sure that Hogtown's SPD parade -- it's 20th annual -- went off without a hitch. It was a bright, sunny but still very cold day for the parade. There were the usual suspects taking part but, all in all, a festive, green event for all.

Subsequently, I dropped by Alice Fazooli's on Adelaide at John for an open house by Casella Wines for its Yellow Tail brand. They hosted about 50 to 60 wine conoisseurs at the chic, long bar/lounge room and showcased Yellow Tail's varietals, including merlot, shiraz, chardonnay and others. To accompany the magnificent wines, Casella/Yellow Tail sprung for a contant supply of nibbles, including chicken skewers, fish and chips, a delightful meat pie, finger sandwiches and many others. Needless to say, it was a fine way to end the weekend!

Wow - it's party time here in Hogtown. It's St. Patrick's Day but not just any ol' St. Patrick's Day, mind you -- it's St. Patrick's Weekend! Whoohoo!

The Night Before SPD (St. Patrick's Day) was a Friday this year and you can bet all those Irish and those who wish they are (me included) were partying it up all night. Call it an early start or a warm-up for the main event. That's right, ladies and gentlement, this year SPD is on a Saturday and, boy, it will be crazy.

I was at the LCBO Summerhill outlet this afternoon (Sat) and there was a steady stream of people going in and coming out with bags full of booze, all in anticipation of the party to come tonight. The LCBO also hosted an Irish whiskey tasting at this location, featuring the Greenore Single Grain Irish Whiskey. I tried some of this whiskey and can attest: it's very potent stuff!

I also had the opportunity to check out that stretch of Yonge Street between Roxborough Street and St. Clair Avenue, an area to which I had never been. There are quite a few quaint, original shops and restaurants in the area. While a busy stretch of Yonge, parts of it also had a nice, neighbourly feel to it.

But back to SPD.

As a good finance guy, I did my due diligence and can report that many an Irish pub had major lineups of eager drinkers of green beer, some lineups going around the corner. Notable establishments where I noticed this unsurprising phenomenon included the Irish Embassy in the Financial District, P.J. O'Brien's in the St. Lawrence Market neighbourhood just east of the Financial District, Fionn MacCool's on the Esplanade, the BierMarkt on the Esplanade, and Scotland Yard on the Esplanade (hmmm, there seems to be a trend here. You don't suppose the party's down on the Esplanade, do you? :)

However, how Irish can a place be if it's named after a police force in London, UK? But I digress ... besides, everyone's considered Irish on SPD! Wear something green, drink green beer or a Guinness, and get the party started!

I must say, it's has sure been quite a while since I last posted something here. Been busy pounding the pavement for a full-time job in the capital markets here in Hogtown.

Now that the Queen's MBA is finished and the consulting gig for Kelly at IPC Securities has also wrapped up, I am eager to find something permanent in investment banking, equity research or private equity.

Despite getting some good interviews with the likes of GMP Securities, Desjardins Securities and Dynamic Fund/Dundee Wealth recently (Jan/Feb), nothing formal has materialized as of yet.

I have the right education, an excellent track record of performance, industry work experience, and am hard-working, a quick-learner, etc. However, apparently these traits of success are NOT enough for Toronto.

In fact, a Torontonian interviewed in this past weekend's Toronto Star newspaper explains his success in Calgary after moving there from Hogtown after difficulty finding the right job here. Ironic, since he is in a field - securities law - that one would figure needs bodies and talent in Hogtown much more than in Cowtown.

Here's an excerpt from the Toronto Star article, "One-way street," from March 3, 2007:

"He wasn't in the right networks and hadn't made enough contacts to edge his way into a law firm that specialized in finance – his passion.

Then he ran across a newspaper article. Calgary's booming, it said. On a whim, he went online and landed a job in the Calgary office of Blake Cassels & Graydon, one of Canada's largest law firms.

Alberta is a province where, unlike Toronto, the job you get is commensurate with the one you're trained to do – rather than the people you know, he says." (emphasis added)

I guess my challenge is that I too don't know the right people, didn't go to the right schools, didn't hang out at the right clubs or watering holes, etc. to get inside this (old boys) network. It's disappointing for me to see that brains and talent can only get you so far, apparently, despite executives all lamenting the shortage of qualified workers.

I hope my handle doesn't have to change to "Cowtown Lotuslander." :)

Ooops! Sorry I've been out of touch for a few days ... I've been busy, as the following will demonstrate ... beer (Freudian slip! :) with me as I try to catch up in one entry!

Well, Tuesday was a bit of a writeoff as my friend Justin, a top investment banking Vice-President at Canaccord Adams in Hogtown, had a meeting scheduled at the same time as our coffee meeting. Oh well, making money takes precedence on Bay Street, so off I went on my own. Hmmmm, maybe I should've asked for a seat at the table!

Wednesday saw me catching up with another Bay Streeter, Greg, who is also an investment banking Vice-President but at Haywood Securities. Greg is a great guy, a former lawyer who got his MBA from Ivey before working for bulge bracket investment banks in New York. A few years ago, he came back to Toronto and now is reaping the rewards of a robust mining finance market. He gave me some "kick in the pants" advice for my job hunt for a Bay Street finance job. Blunt but clear, it was a bit painful to take but Greg meant well and was speaking from personal experience. I appreciated his time and advice and hope I can put his suggestions into action.

Later in the afternoon, I checked in with my boss, Kelly, Vice-President and Director or Corporate Finance and Equity Capital Markets at IPC Securities. Now Kelly's a great guy - smart, driven, creative, inspiring, a great leader and motivator - and he's only in his 30's! We touched base on the recently-launched Alpha Energy Flow-Through Fund and decided on what I had to do to follow-up with some IPC reps on their Alpha orders.

In the evening, I caught a webcast of an installment of Hart House's "Grand Design" series of lectures to explore "the architecture of ideas, people and places." Featuring Lisa Rochon and Mark Kingwell and moderated by Larry Richards, they and the audience delved into issues related to urban planning and architecture in Toronto. One of the issues raised at the session was that many cities have "myths" behind them - Paris for romance, New York as Gotham, LA as Hollywood, etc. - but was is Toronto's myth? Hmmmm, there doesn't appear to be one, or perhaps it tries to be too many things to too many people. Renown Queen's School of Business marketing guru extraordinaire and professor, the oft-quoted Ken Wong, once said that Toronto does a lot of things well but does not do anything great. As a result, Toronto does not particularly stand out in many people's minds as a destination, as a place to visit, etc. That is, in marketing-speak, Toronto has not really differentiated itself in a crowded marketplace of cities vying for tourist dollars. I'd recommend that Tourism Toronto just hire Ken and he'll find the fix for the problem.

Thursday, I finally caught up with Justin, the Canaccord Adams investment banker and, may I add, one of Hogtown's most eligible bachelors. With a cool new loft in King Street West, hangouts at Lobby and others, and rainmaking deals on Bay Street, he's on the fast track up the Bay Street career ladder. Anyway, he was kind enough to spare a few moments of his day, buy me a tea, and share some insights into the market and current job prospects. Justin always takes the time to help out and share his knowledge - clearly a model for us all to emulate.

After making some more calls for Kelly at IPC, I headed off to meet my friend Frances for a quick dinner before we TTC up to Yonge and Eglinton for the premiere of the movie "A Good Year," starring Aussie bad boy Russell Crowe and directed by Sir Ridley Scott ("Alien", "Gladiator", "Blade Runner", among others). We stopped by the BeerBistro on King just east of Yonge for some beer-infused pizza and mussels. Mmmmm, delicious! Frances did the ordering and her choices were bang-on fantastic! She is quite the gourmand and knows her way around a menu, let me assure you.

While "A Good Year" won't set any box office records (in fact, it sorta flopped over the opening weekend, I hear), I found it a nice, relaxing and enjoyable flick. Clearly a departure for Scott and Crowe in style and content, one must bear in mind it likely wasn't intended to conquer the box office hordes but provide contemplation and reflection as the film explores how Crowe's character, a wildly successful proprietary trader of gilts in the City (London, England) finds himself once again after inheriting his late uncle's sprawling country estate in la belle Provence in the south of France. Eventually, he finds his roots (literally, it seems - the estate also makes wine!) and trades in (no pun intended ... really) the trading floor for the vineyard. Oh, and also for a very attractive mademoiselle who catches his eye :)

Well, the weekend was spent mostly at the Toronto Condo Show, held at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. While some of the exhibitors were interesting, the main attraction for me was the stellar lineup of speakers over the three days of the show. Condos are the "it" thing for real estate nowadays, especially in Toronto and Vancouver where they are the go-to form of real estate for many first-time and/or young buyers due to being much more affordable than the traditional detached home.

Well, that's it for now - gotta run so I'll fill in the rest later! Thanks for surfing by ...

Spent Sunday and most of Monday working on our MBA capstone project for Impact Machine, our consulting client. A small two-person hockey design firm based in downtown Toronto, they are looking to expand into being an end-to-end "design to store" solutions provider for retailers, sporting goods stores or sports brands.

Sunday was spent reviewing the initial draft of our capstone project report as well as a Powerpoint presentation with our team's situational analysis, assessment and recommendations for Impact Machine and its stated goal to broaden its business to being a full-line solutions provider and away from being a niche design-only firm.

Monday started off with Prof. Dan Thornton's class in financial accounting and valuation, based largely on the residual income model (RIM) developed by Ohlson (1995) and Feltham and Ohlson (1995) and described in the journal "Contemporary Accounting Research." Although somewhat controversial in that the model claims to be able to identify mispriced securities (i.e. those that are overvalued or undervalued) on a consistent basis, it does not appear to be widely adopted by analysts on Wall Street or Bay Street. If so, there is the opportunity for those versed in RIM to potentially generate excess returns by using this model, especially in Canada where, apparently, few analysts have even heard of RIM, let alone be practitioners of it.

At lunch, my mind still abuzz with RIM formulas, some of my classmates and I met over lunch at Casey's to put our combined MBA brains together for a very good cause - the planning and production of a New Year's Eve fundraising event for the benefit of a charity organization dedicated to suicide awareness and prevention. Building on our initial meeting last Thursday night at Czehoski on Queen Street West, we're thinking now of a "Black and Bling Ball" (i.e. dress in black with LOTS of accessories!!!) for an elegant yet energizing night out to bid goodbye to one year and hello to the new one!

After lunch, our team was back on the Impact Machine case and spent the next few hours refining the Powerpoint presentation. Given that Impact Machine's fame is in the hockey business, team member Alison came up with the idea of framing the slides as a hockey rink and using animated pucks going towards a net as a way to keep track of the progress of the deck! Wow, talk about creativity! Those guys at Digital Cement must be happy to have her there!

Well, it's a crisp, sunny but chilly November day in Hogtown. Some of my gung-ho MBA classmates from the Queen's University MBA program - recently rated the # 1 MBA program outside of the United States by BusinessWeek magazine AND for the second time in a row - planned a football game at historic Rosedale Park in the heart of the tres posh Rosedale residential area of Toronto. This place is where you'll find stately mansions in various classical architectural styles and commanding multi-million dollar price tags. Better start that Lotto 6/49 subscription soon if you want one of these homes!

Alas, as much as I wanted to join in on the festivities, I was waaaay behind on the contingency plan for Impact Machine, our MBA team's consulting client for our capstone course. They have big plans to expand their sports design business beyond the game of hockey and we are doing our best to help them. Some of the brightest minds in the next generation of Canadian business leaders are here on my MBA team and in my MBA class. They are all young, intelligent, articulate and ... well, there are so many platitudes I can use here but they truly are amazing people whose achievements, experiences and stories continue to awe and inspire me.