Peregrine's last days, by Andre Lee
Pioneering the Asian bond business
Building the business at Peregrine
The approach of the Asian financial crisis
When did you get into investment banking? By 1988 I was really debating with myself as to whether or not I should go and get an MBA, as many of my friends were doing, or strike out on a completely new path. One area that began to interest me was finance because it seemed to encompass a survey of all things: politics, social culture, demographics, markets. So I tried to get into a few Wall Street firms at that time but I didn't have an MBA and I didn't have any experience. It wasn't easy. So I responded to an ad in the paper from Shearson Lehman Hutton for financial consultants. I went for interviews and was accepted and went through their training programme. Coming out of the training programme I decided I would focus on trying to do business with Korean banks, which I think was a notch above what I guess, as a financial consultant, I was supposed to do.
You were supposed to be a retail broker?
Right.