Andrea Andolfatto
Bocconi University - Milan, Graduated in 2022
My academic background is in Economics; I hold a MSc in Quantitative Finance. I applied to Mafirm to deepen my knowledge in Finance and further my career. From the first day, the faculty guided me by addressing my doubts and helped me choose the career path that would best suit me. I also enjoyed the small class size and treasure the friendships I made. The faculty at Mafirm provided me both with connections to the industry and with the necessary preparation and information to successfully obtain fellowships during the Ph.D. application process. I am currently a Ph.D. student in Finance at Bocconi University in Milan.
Veronica Cannas
KPMG Germany - Frankfurt am Main, Graduated in 2021
I studied Quantitative Finance at University of Tor Vergata, Rome. I applied to the Master in Finance, Insurance and Risk Management at Collegio Carlo Alberto because of the renowned placement skills and because I found the study program very interesting and able to complete my preparation. The most interesting part of the Mafirm program were the group work and the individual projects that we completed during the master, which helped me to translate theory into practice and to further develop myanalytical and problem-solving skills. After I graduated at the CCA in July 2021, in August 2021 I started to work as an Associate (full-time) in the Riskand Treasury department of KPMG Germany, in the Frankfurt office. The CCA really helped me to do interviews with several companies, in Italy and abroad, both organizing job fairsand thanks to professors (in my case Professor Schoenleber, who taught us the applied course “Python for Finance”) using their existing network to send out our CVs.
Giulia Carbotti
European Central Bank - Frankfurt am Main, Graduated in 2021
My name is Giulia Carbotti and I am currently a Financial Risk Analyst at the European Central Bank. After an undergraduate degree in Finance and a Master of Science in Finance & Banking at the University of Tor Vergata (Rome), I attended the Master in Finance and Risk Management at Collegio Carlo Alberto in the academic year 2020 – 2021. I decided to apply to the MAFIRM program because I felt that it would help me to choose the right path for my career and to pursue it; and in fact, MAFIRM provided me with a strong support to explore my career options and to undertake them (e.g. via career days and network creation), along with a very qualifying combination of theoretical, practical, and professional courses. It helped me to understand that I wanted to work in the risk management area of the Eurosystem, and indeed after finishing my studies there I became a trainee in Risk Management at the European Central Bank, in Frankfurt am Main.
Luigi Cardillo
Fincite - Frankfurt am Main, Graduated in 2021
I started being interested in financial markets after an internship as a commodity derivatives trader before starting university. After my graduation, I was dreaming to be a systematic trader or portfolio manager. I felt that I needed not only to get deeper in computing, mathematics, and statistics but also to get led through the complexity of financial markets. I thought that the Collegio Carlo Albero was the ideal place to get what I was looking for. The MAFIRM enabled me to understand which are the most interesting and new challenges in the financial industry and gave me the tools to start and define the first steps in my journey to become a systematic portfolio manager. The professors and colleagues were amazing. I must mention in particular Professor Brandimarte and Professor Schoenleber who helped me a lot in searching for a job. The whole faculty has been concretely open to suggestions. Professor Marfe` guided us through the opportunities in academics and the Ph.D. path. Professors Tebaldi, Brandimarte, Pomante, and Brandolinigave us good hints for effective interview preparation. I started my career as a Quantitative Researcher, working on systematic investing strategies based on deep learning. It was a full-time position in a young fintech, Qi4m. Now I am a Quantitative Researcher at Finite, in Frankfurt am Main. Here I work on developing algorithms, mathematical models, and artificial intelligence applications for asset management.
Sara D'Ecclesiis
Poste Vita - Rome, Graduated in 2023
Following my completion of a Master's degree in Economics and Finance at LUISS University, I engaged in a year-long traineeship in Banking Supervision at the European Central Bank in Frankfurt. While it provided invaluable experience in an international setting, I opted to pursue the Master in Finance, Insurance, and Risk Management by Collegio Carlo Alberto and University of Turin, influenced by the recommendations of two former students employed at the ECB. This program served as a unique opportunity to enhance my quantitative and coding skills, surrounded by bright individuals from diverse backgrounds. Subsequent to completing the master's program, I secured a permanent position as an Investment Analyst at Poste Vita in Rome.
Giuseppe Florio
UBS - Zurich, Graduated in 2022
After obtaining my Master's degree in Finance at the University of Trento, and following a brief professional experience in a consulting firm, I decided to enroll in the Mafirm offered by the Collegio Carlo Alberto, eager to further develop my knowledge of Quantitative Finance and Programming. Collegio’s course program is very challenging but provides a solid foundation in quantitative finance and the main programming languages used in the financial industry today. What I particularly appreciate about the program is the fact that each course, in addition to providing a theoretical overview of the topics covered, includes practical application in Matlab, Python, or R, which allows you to master skills that are highly sought after by companies today. Attending the Mafirm was an important step toward finding a job in the increasingly competitive and ever-changing environment that is the financial industry. Today, I work as a Risk Modeling & Analytics Specialist at UBS in the Zurich office.
Daniele Plutino
Goldman Sachs - London, Graduated in 2022
I obtained my Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics in Rome Sapienza and a MSc in Mathematical Engineering in Turin Politecnico. I decided then to apply for the Mafirm at CCA to study how mathematics can be applied in the context of finance. The application was made after a suggestion by Prof. Brandimarte who was supervising my MSc thesis. The thing I liked the most was sharing this experience with amazing students from different academic backgrounds: that allowed us to always have different perspectives on the same topic and therefore discussions were always interesting. After the Mafirm I started a full-time position in Goldman Sachs London office as a Quantitative Strategist.
Vittorio Ruffo
Frankfurt School of Finance and Management, Graduated in 2022
I studied quantitative finance at the University of Verona, where I got a master's degree in banking and finance. During the second year of my master's degree, I became aware that I wanted to further explore what I had studied up to that point. By comparing myself with colleagues and doctoral students who had followed a similar path as me, I began to learn about the MAFIRM offered by Collegio Carlo Alberto. I applied with the idea of deepening my study further, before pursuing a doctoral degree. An appealing feature of the Master's program concerns the topics covered. Having a few programming and machine learning courses alongside the more classical finance subjects allows students to get a more comprehensive preparation. I recently joined the doctoral program in finance offered by the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management. The professors at the Collegio Carlo Alberto were immediately very helpful in providing me with precise information regarding the admission procedure, the structure, the difficulties, and the possibilities that a doctorate entails. Although I was already intent on pursuing this path, being able to ask the professors for help was crucial in orienting me in this process with which I was completely unfamiliar, especially in terms of where to undertake the program.