Growing up in Chile, Natalia Gallardo Schnettler M.Fin. ’12 aspired to be a lawyer. While attending Pontifical Catholic University, Schnettler took a finance economy class that spiked her interest in finance and research. She then sought out graduate programs to match her interest in equity research, and that brought her to MIT Sloan’s Master of Finance program.
“I spoke with my classmates and alumni of the M.Fin. program. The alumni had only great things to say about the program and the School. I liked the focus of the program and knew that it would be the best fit for me and my career,” she said. “I also wanted to study with great professors and meet and learn from classmates who come all over the world, and I knew the M.Fin. program would allow me to do all of this.”
Now in her second semester at MIT Sloan, Schnettler is involved with the Investment Management Club and helped plan its March 9 conference. She worked with Brian Cloutier MBA ’13 to organize the Low Volatility Strategies panel and found experts in the field, such as Sam Wilderman, co-head of Quantitative Equity Team at GMO Mutual Funds, and Mac Eysenbach, director of research at Martingale Asset Management, to attend the conference.
“Working on the conference was a great way to get to know students in other MIT Sloan programs. I worked with Brian putting together the agenda and finding people to sit on the panel. Since I’ve never worked in the United States, it was also a great way to make connections with companies and people in the industry,” she noted.
In her free time, Schnettler has enjoyed taking salsa classes at MIT and spent her winter break traveling in Europe. She traveled to seven countries in 40 days, visiting with her M.Fin. classmates in Spain, France, Hungary, Austria, the Czech Republic, the United Kingdom and Italy.
Before she returns home, and to a position at the Central Bank of Chile, Schnettler will spend her summer interning at Windham Capital Management, a position she landed with the help of Senior Lecturer Mark Kritzman. While at Windham she will conduct capital market forecasting, working to measure the risk that the company will face in certain investments. She said that the great mix of classes she has taken at MIT Sloan — including Applied Fixed Income and Speculative Strategies (15.505) with Doug Breeden, Valuation (15.S02) with Stewart Myers, and Functional and Strategic Finance (15.S12) with Robert Merton — will help her have a successful internship and career.
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