Alejandro Faesi of Banorte: In love with math

“Diversity is a basic principle of justice, because we have all been a minority at some point in our lives. We need to realize that so we can recognize when we’re being unfair.”

Alejandro Faesi

In the late 1980s, Alejandro Faesi often answered his high school classmates’ questions about the subject that had always come easiest to him: math.

“So, I prepared cards that read ‘Math, Physics, and Chemistry Classes’ with my phone number and handed them out to the junior high moms waiting for their kids outside,” recalls Faesi, who today is Head of Global Markets and Institutional Sales at Grupo Financiero Banorte.

This is how he got his first job in math tutoring. He charged by the hour and earned enough to buy his first “vochito” (in Mexico, the Volkswagen Beetle) to drive to college.

He was so good with numbers that when it came time to choose his college major, he decided to study actuarial science over his two other areas of interest: law and medicine. “I chose it for the love of math,” he says.

Compared with a law degree, math doesn’t require spending a lot of time reading and memorizing, which also gave him other advantages: “Because of that, I didn’t have to spend a lot of time studying and was able to work while getting my degree.”

Even now, he continues advising his family. “Sometimes I’m asked how I remember logarithms, trigonometry, calculus, derivatives and integrals. It’s because I saw them so often, I came to understand them very well; reviewing basic concepts so many times strengthened my technical skills. It’s like going to the gym, but for your brain,” he describes.

This basic knowledge and the way he learns are still useful in his current work.

Sports discipline in finance

Faesi finds it important to keep learning new things. “When knowledge is within reach, you have to take it; you need to keep your curiosity alive over the years to avoid getting stuck and trapped in your comfort zone,” he reflects.

He believes that training in areas that are not within your current job description gives you an advantage that will result in professional growth. “You have to earn management positions and seniority first, not the other way around. That is, you don’t get the position first and then say, ‘I need to learn more about this topic I don’t understand or is not my strong suit.’ Rather, you earn the position because you have a useful understanding of many areas.”

He has also learned a lot from people he has worked with over the years. “One of them was my first boss when I started at Grupo Bursátil Mexicano as a trainee. His name is Gerardo Madrazo and he taught me everything I needed to know about the business; besides being Head of the Money Desk, he was also a triathlete, which wasn’t very common in 1991.”

His boss shared this culture of health and discipline in their daily work, which was an important lesson for Faesi — who now has about ten marathons under his belt, one even finished in under three hours. This is why he has included these same teachings in his own professional life.

“A trader must be disciplined enough to know when to take losses or when to stop increasing them or when to avoid surpassing the threshold and just stay disciplined for the sake of the institution,” he says.

Sailing and love at first sight

Besides math, finance and sports, Faesi has another passion: sailing.

“My surname is Swiss. My grandfather came from Switzerland and immigrated to the United States, where he met my grandmother, then came to Mexico. He loved lakes, mountains and sailing, so that was something I learned from him and my dad as a child,” he explains.

Sailing is ideal for spending a little more time with his family, since it combines enjoying nature with exercise. “Windsurfing is done with one sail and it’s pretty physical, because you combine speed with water; but I also like to sail sitting down, with long pants and shoes, on a two-sail boat. It’s like going for a walk in the park,” he describes.

Just as he’s been passionate about many things throughout his life, finance was love at first sight.

“When I was studying actuarial science, a professor told me there was a job opportunity at GBM. When I went to the interview and saw the trading room with all the screens and hustle, I fell in love with the profession. Thirty years later, I’m still in love, I’ve been faithful and I want to devote myself to it every day,” he says.

As with all “relationships,” there have been difficult times, such as the 2008 global economic crisis. However, he learned most from the 1994 crisis in Mexico, which also affected all of Latin America. “It was a tough crisis. It seemed like the country had been modernizing, but that’s where you could tell it was just barely getting started,” he recalls.

“I was 25 and just starting my career, but because of that situation, I had to start doing more senior, in-depth and critical tasks. I enjoyed problem-solving, so I believed in myself and saw that this was for me.”

Faesi believes that being informed is key, both locally and globally, and not just on financial matters. “Issues that move markets tend to change, so you need to be an expert in many things. One day it can be oil; the next, it can be some law reform, or what they’re doing in Texas, or what’s decided by the Arabs or the OPEC. Now you need to ‘play epidemiologist,’ because you need to know when the vaccine is coming and how long it will take to reach the population. With Brexit, you needed to know how British politics works and what constitutes the House of Lords. And other times you need to understand issues such as the United States electoral system,” he explains. “The good thing is that if you learn it today, it’ll help you in the future, although every crisis is different.”

This is why Faesi spends a few hours a day reading the news. “To make decisions, you need to be informed. That’s why I use Bloomberg a lot, and read local and international newspapers on my phone and iPad, not to mention looking through social network sites like Twitter,” he explains.

Be prepared for anything

Books are also important to Faesi. “There’s a book I’d like to recommend: Factfulness: Ten Reasons Why We’re Wrong About the World — And Why Things Are Better Than You Think, by Anna Rosling Rönnlund, Hans Rosling and Ola Rosling,” he says.

He explains that the book analyzes data positively to debunk certain myths and show that the world is doing better than it seems on issues such as poverty, education and health.

Likewise, he thinks that looking at facts from different angles is crucial to learning more and to get there, it’s important to boost diversity and inclusion in organizations.

“This is a key issue and I see a lot of progress, but more needs to be done,” he admits. “Diversity is a basic principle of justice, because we have all been a minority at some point in our lives. We need to realize that so we can recognize when we’re being unfair,” he stresses. “Having all kinds of members, from different cultures, religions, etc., enriches the team.”

In addition, when it comes to finance, he recommends being prepared for anything and having a clear direction.

“It helps with a sudden storm or a crisis because you won’t have time to prepare when it hits. You don’t need to think that you always have everything under control,” he says. “The current health crisis is the best example: it’s something we hadn’t seen in years.”

This is how Faesi shows that you can feel love for family, for work and even for math — why not?

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this blog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Bloomberg.

Bloomberg invited the GETTERS of the financial market in Latin America to share their insightful stories about their careers, their success stories and the challenges they had to face while not only witnessing the development of this fast-paced environment, but actively contributing to its evolution by creating new tools, sharing best practices and inspiring change.