Читать книгу Investment Banking For Dummies - Matthew Krantz - Страница 62

Traders sitting in their living rooms in their pajamas may be the image conjured by the term active trader. But it turns out, a vast majority of the millions of orders to buy and sell stocks and bonds each day don’t come from the keyboards of ambitious day traders, but the massive trading operations of the world’s largest investment banking operations.

Most major investment banks maintain trading desks. These trading desks are responsible for buying and selling securities. The trading operations of investment banks are typically involved in buying and selling everything from stock to bonds, futures contracts (contracts that allow buyers to take delivery of an asset at a certain time in the future at a preset price), commodities (claims on real assets ranging from energy to agricultural products), and foreign exchange contracts.

The trading desk of an investment bank often sits at the epicenter of its operations. On one hand, the investment bank is tasked with selling securities to help raise money for clients; on the other hand, it’s in charge of helping to find buyers. The buyers and sellers often intersect at the trading operations.