The Structurer
Every note is a bond plus options. Pick the wrong shape and the client finds out at maturity.
The brief
You run structuring on a products desk. Clients come to you with a need, a view and a constraint — a pension fund that cannot report a loss, a family office reaching for yield, a treasurer hedging a currency, a foundation that needs income and has been promised 8%. Out of a bond and a few options you build them a note, and the payoff diagram you draw is what they will actually own. The temptation never changes: the richest structure for the desk is almost always the wrong shape for the client, and nobody discovers the difference while markets are calm. Sell the wrong shape and you will make your quarter and lose the relationship, your standing and eventually the desk. Sell nothing but capital protection and you will keep everyone safe and earn nothing at all. The job is knowing which client is which.
How you play it
The decision is a shape: choose a structure and its payoff diagram draws live — floor, cap, barrier, coupon — then the market runs through it.
The job: Structurer — Assembling investment products out of a bond and some options — and deciding which client should own which shape.
What a structurer actually does →What you're judged on
Every decision is marked to market server-side. These are the meters that move — run one to zero and the simulation ends there.
What it tests
No trivia — the simulation only asks what the chair actually has to know.
Where you learn this
This one is the arcade's own boss — it isn't the finale of a single game, it's what the whole arcade has been teaching. Liquidity, leverage, bank runs, systemic risk and moral hazard all arrive in the same sixty-two hours, and nothing gates it: sit down now, get overrun, and go find out why.
Browse the courses →Other chairs
The Weekend
Sixty-two hours to Tokyo's open. You cannot save everyone — and one of them you cannot lose.
The President
Every policy has two halves: what you do, and who pays. The bond market grades the second one.
The First Year
Twelve months on your own. No perfect month — only wiser and poorer ones.
The Newsroom
One shift on the data desk. Every story is a stats trap in disguise.
Mission Control
No options to pick — do the math, key in the number, bring them home.
The Policy Chair
You are the central bank. One rate, every quarter, a whole economy on the line.
The CFO's Chair
You run the firm's capital. Ten board meetings, one question every time: where does the cash go?
The Pit
You run the book. The tape moves, the Greeks bite, margin is real. Survive the session.
Your Own Worst Enemy
The market can't hurt you. You can. Ten moments, one enemy — the one making the decisions.
The Desk
Run a derivatives desk for one week — it does not stay calm.
Rotation Day
Ten desks, one stack of cards each. Sort them right — and never, ever misfile ethics.
The Expert Witness
Ten regression tables enter evidence. The significant one is usually the trap.
The War Room
The VaR says you're fine. The tail says otherwise. Ten audits — read which one is lying.