CQ_FinForte | Akshat Mittal | Morgan Stanley

Interviewer: Hello, everyone! I am Pratham Sharma, from Communiqué. Today, we are catching up with Akshat Mittal, who recently bagged an elite internship at Morgan Stanley. We are going to break down his entire journey, from the initial shortlists to the final interview rounds. Welcome, Akshat. Great to have you here.

Akshat: Hi, Pratham. Glad to be here, and hello to everyone tuning in.

Interviewer: Let’s dive straight into the raw details. Walk me through the screening phase. What was the overall interview process like for the finance roles you targeted, the number of rounds, and the kind of tests you had to face?

Akshat: Right. So for finance, I ended up with two major shortlists. The first was Morgan Stanley’s Sales and Trading role, and the second was Nomura’s Wholesale Strategy role. To give a quick distinction, Sales and Trading is heavily finance and tech-oriented, while Wholesale Strategy is more of a hybrid between consulting and strategy.

For Morgan Stanley, everything kicks off with a CGPA cutoff. In my cycle, it was an internal, unpublicized filter that sat right around the 8.6–8.7 bracket. Once you clear that, you hit their online test, followed by two technical interview rounds, and it finally wraps up with an HR round.

Nomura handles things a bit differently for Wholesale Strategy. They run a couple of casual “buddy rounds” where you interact with team members before heading into the formal interviews. Since I didn’t actually sit for their final interview, I can only speak extensively on the Morgan Stanley side.

Interviewer: Fair enough. Let’s talk about that Morgan Stanley online test, because campus rumors always make it sound like an absolute gauntlet. What does it actually look like?

Akshat: It honestly is a gauntlet — it’s an intensive 6 to 7 round assessment. They aren’t just testing finance; they track your entire communication and analytical suite. It features reading comprehension, a writing section, a listening round where you repeat spoken prompts, and a dedicated speaking section. Then they hit you with a mental ability round full of puzzles and probability questions, a core finance section that heavily focuses on option pricing and fixed income, and they wrap the whole thing up with two coding questions.

Interviewer: That is brutal for an initial filter. Once you survived the test and got called into the interview rooms, how did the actual rounds play out?

Akshat: The first round was heavily technical, centering on the core mechanics of bonds, bond pricing, and standard probability puzzles. The second round shifted into extreme CV grilling, where they essentially cross-examined everything on my resume, mixed with a few more analytical puzzles. After that, it was a smooth transition into the HR round, which was entirely situational.

On the flip side, the Nomura buddy rounds I attended were much more conversational. We discussed the company’s structure, standard CV walking, and walked through a strategic business problem regarding how Nomura could aggressively grow its revenues.

Interviewer: You mentioned bond pricing and option pricing. If you had to pinpoint the exact questions that made you sweat or the concepts they kept circling back to, what would they be?

Akshat: In the first Morgan Stanley round, they grilled me on how bond prices dynamically shift relative to maturity and how different macroeconomic factors disrupt those valuations.

When you get to the HR and situational rounds, the questions sound standard but require deep reflection. They want to know exactly how you navigate internal team conflicts, how you perform under structural pressure, and your genuine motivations behind choosing that specific role and firm.

Interviewer: Let’s talk strategy for the juniors. What are the frequently asked questions or themes in these elite finance interviews that people absolutely must master, especially when trying to prove they are a “fit” during behavioral rounds?

Akshat: Number one, without question, is total ownership of your CV. If you write down a project, you need to know it down to its absolute foundations. Interviewers will seamlessly dive into the deepest layers of your models because they assume that if it’s on paper, you are an expert on it. If you have a CFA Level 1 or FRM certification, expect them to pull concepts directly from that curriculum. For strategy-centric roles like Nomura’s, you also need to be fluent in solving case studies.

On the technical side, standard brain teasers, probability, and prop-stats are non-negotiable across the board.

Lastly, you cannot fake market awareness. You must know what is shaking the global economy. Read up on macro trends from the last two years — global tariff wars, geopolitical conflicts like the Iran crisis, currency fluctuations regarding the Rupee, and fluctuating government bond yields. You need to hold an opinion on how these macro events ripple back into the Indian and global markets.

Interviewer: Looking at the timeline, the third-year batch is stepping into placements later this year. What can they do between right now and December to drastically maximize their shortlists and conversions?

Akshat: Since I haven’t navigated the placement cycle myself, take this with a grain of salt, but the foundational roadmap doesn’t change. Double down on fixed income, derivatives, and equity research.

More importantly, look at where the industry is moving. Both Morgan Stanley and Nomura are heavily indexing on data analytics and Machine Learning (ML) within traditional finance roles. If you can build sharp ML and data manipulation skills right now, your profile instantly stands out in a crowded pool.

Interviewer: Let’s pivot to your personal narrative. What was the spark that pushed you toward finance? Out of all the verticals — IB, corporate finance, quant, markets — what hooks you the most?

Akshat: It was really a combination of my environment and my academics. My family comes from a financial background, so I grew up around the vocabulary. Coming to IIT Kharagpur and being in the Economics department naturally complemented that interest, giving me a structured framework to understand market behavioral loops.

When it comes to areas of focus, Investment Banking, Markets, and Private Equity are easily the most intellectually stimulating and lucrative spaces for me. The velocity of those sectors is hard to match.

Interviewer: When CDC season hits, the sheer volume of companies can be overwhelming. How did you approach shortlisting the firms you applied to? Did you obsess over deal flow, business models, or culture before hitting submit?

Akshat: Honestly, Pratham, the finance pool on campus doesn’t give you massive leverage to be overly selective. The common playbook is to apply to every tier-1 firm that opens up for your profile and figure out the nuances as you advance.

That said, Morgan Stanley and Nomura are global heavyweights. My research was heavily rooted in networking — talking to campus seniors and alumni working there. They gave me a realistic look at the actual desk roles, institutional culture, and deal flow, which made me incredibly eager to convert those specific opportunities.

Interviewer: You mentioned our Economics background. Do you think our department or academic tag gives us an unfair advantage, or does it come with implicit friction? How should someone from a non-core branch navigate this?

Akshat: It definitely acts as a tailwind. Even though the heavy-hitting electives in our department kick in a bit after the CDC cycle concludes, the mindset it builds toward interpreting global markets and macroeconomic frameworks is highly valued by recruiters.

Pairing that department background with a structured certification like the CFA Level 1 really solidified my understanding of complex financial instruments. It definitely didn’t hurt my shortlists. For non-core students, it simply means you have to self-engineer that baseline knowledge through projects and certifications to signal the same level of intent.

Interviewer: Looking ahead, what are the long-term career goals, and how exactly does grinding through this specific summer internship move the needle for you?

Akshat: I haven’t locked down a rigid 10-year plan just yet. The financial landscape shifts too quickly. My immediate goal is pure exploration.

Stepping into an institutional giant like Morgan Stanley allows you to look under the hood of global market operations. You get to sit across from industry experts, observe highly specialized desks, and see how massive capital moves. That hands-on exposure is exactly what will help me crystallize my ultimate career trajectory.

Interviewer: Let’s build a concrete blueprint for a student who just finished their first year and is entering their second year right now. If they want to break into high-finance by their third year, how should they build their profile from scratch?

Akshat: Do not overcomplicate it early on. Follow this exact progression:

Phase 1 (The Language): Master financial statements. Learn how a balance sheet, income statement, and cash flow statement talk to each other.

Phase 2 (The Valuation): Once you can read the statements, learn how companies actually generate cash and how analysts discount those cash flows to value an asset.

Phase 3 (The Instruments): Start exploring Equity and Debt. Equity is the most intuitive starting point. Once comfortable, push into Fixed Income and Derivatives.

Phase 4 (The Market Context): Build a daily habit of tracking global markets. Don’t do it just for an interview; do it to understand how political choices affect capital.

Phase 5 (The Signal): Look into structured certs like the CFA if you want a roadmap. It’s highly recognized on campus and acts as a massive stamp of commitment, though it isn’t a mandatory silver bullet.

Interviewer: Brilliant blueprint. Let’s wrap this up with a reality check on the classic campus resume metrics: CGPA, internships, PORs, competitions, and extracurriculars. Give me the raw, unfiltered breakdown of how much they actually matter when the rubber meets the road.

Akshat: Let’s demystify them one by one:

Academics / CGPA: High importance. A pristine CGPA is your gatekeeper; it’s what unlocks the shortlist room in the first place.

Internships: Highly critical. Having a previous stint in a finance or economic domain signals that you aren’t just exploring on a whim — it proves you understand professional settings.

Positions of Responsibility (PORs): Zero direct technical relevance in high finance. Nobody is shortlisting you because you managed an event. However, they are gold mines for the HR round. They give you the exact behavioural stories you need to confidently explain crisis management and team leadership.

Competitions: Unless you win a major national case or valuation cup, it won’t drastically alter your resume’s shortlisting power. But the process of competing is unmatched. Building an equity research or valuation deck forces you to solve real-world industry problems.

Extracurriculars: They round you out as a human being and serve as excellent conversational hooks to break the ice with an interviewer.

My ultimate advice? Stop over-optimizing your decisions purely based on what you think looks good for CDC. Nobody on the outside truly understands the backend mechanics of how a company selects candidates on any given day — it is highly situational. Focus heavily on genuine value addition and skill acquisition, and the profile will take care of itself.

Interviewer: That is as grounded as advice gets. Akshat, thanks for hopping on this call and giving us the absolute truth behind the prep. Best of luck with the desk at Morgan Stanley this summer!

Akshat: Thanks a lot, Pratham. Appreciate the conversation!

For more updates, join the Road to Intern group.