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10 May 2010

JMSC Student Lands Job at Bloomberg

JMSC student Marco Lui, who is currently completing his Master of Journalism course, has landed a job at Bloomberg.

He follows in a long line of JMSC students and alumni to secure jobs at the financial news provider.

Marco Lui

Marco Lui

The 25-year-old Hong Kong Chinese journalism student has been offered a position as a reporter on the ‘Speed Desk’ where he will cover news and earning reports with, as the role suggests, incredible speed.

Lui credits an internship he did in January at Bloomberg as being the key to gaining full time employment.

“If I hadn’t been a student I wouldn’t have got the internship which was a foot in the door. It was also useful to do the internship in January as now the summer internships are much more competitive.”

Marco Lui completed a double major at HKU in 2007 in Journalism, and in Economics and Finance. It was during this time that he gained the dual grounding in business journalism that gained him his first job at the Hong Kong Economic Times when he graduated first time round.

However, after a year as a financial reporter, he quit and moved into marketing at a mutual fund company. Lui said he found the job boring and missed going out to interviews. Then the market crashed.

“I decided I’d like to go back into journalism and was speaking to Professor Ying Chan (Head of the JMSC) about it. She suggested that I return to the JMSC to study [for] a Master in Journalism in order to learn about English language reporting from the likes of Rusty Todd.”

Professor Rusty Todd

Professor Rusty Todd

Professor Todd, a long time reporter and editor at The Asian Wall Street Journal, specialises in business journalism and editing.

“Rusty Todd taught us how to write in an international media style,” says Lui. “It’s very similar to Bloomberg’s style so I can really hit the ground running.”

Lui was given the job after several rounds of nerve-racking interviews. He is extremely happy to have been successful and to be returning into the financial markets as a journalist again: “The things I am looking forward to most are the sheer speed of the job and also the emphasis on accuracy.”

Marco follows in the footsteps of many other JMSC students who have studied at the JMSC then been employed by Bloomberg. JMSC students are often keen to work in financial journalism because it is so important in this region.

The JMSC has a strong focus on business journalism and arms students with the tools of the trade through the teachings of Professor Todd and other staff, like Jeff Timmermans, who focus specifically on business and finance. In addition, many students do internships in financial journalism media which gives them the right experience on their CVs when looking for work.

Cornelius Rahn (MJ 2009) did an internship at Bloomberg in Frankfurt before being hired there and Elaine Chan (MJ 2007) did an internship for Bloomberg in Hong Kong and now works for the speed desk in New York.

JMSC alums now working at Bloomberg include William Bi (MJ 2006) in Beijing, Mark Lee (MJ 2004) in Hong Kong, Stuart Biggs (MJ2004) in Tokyo and Greg Ahlstrand (MJ 2009) bureau chief in Jakarta. Other MJs who got Bloomberg internships this summer include Ronnie Koo and Alison Zhou, both in Hong Kong, and Monami Yui in Tokyo. Saul Sugarman (MJ 2009) was also hired as a multimedia producer for Bloomberg in Hong Kong but has since moved on to San Francisco where he works as a freelancer.

Marco Lui is the recipient of the Young Journalist Scholarship contributed by Frank Proctor, publisher of Muse Magazine. He completes his MJ at the end of next semester and starts work at Bloomberg on June 7.