Internship dealing with the stock market?

I just want to be part of the chaotic environment of the volatile market. What sort of internship should I look for that will put me into that situation? I read enough books on stocks, now I would like to see how investment banks make it happen. I live in NJ.

Not many people understand what Wall Street does. Most books one can read on "stocks" are not that relevant. Think about it -- did any of those books suggest anything akin to people shouting in the trading pits?

In terms of equities ("stocks") and the kind of thing you would see on TV, there are pretty much four big categories.

1) Retail brokers. These are the guys dialing up grandmothers to deal stocks. I don't think this is what you had in mind, even though a lot of big firms have broad retail distribution networks (Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, etc). Imagine a guy in a cheap suit sitting in a small office with a phone.

2) Institutional sales and trading. The salespeople are guys who are trying to sell brokerage services to pension funds, mutual funds, insurance companies, and so forth. Imagine well-spoken business suits flying around meeting clients, carrying business cards that say "Goldman Sachs" or "Lehman Brothers". There are traders behind the scenes of these salespeople responsible for executing orders, and typically it's really just a game of buying some equities here, holding it for a while, selling some there, etc. The trick is not to make money through growth of the stock, but really to get a little cut in the middle.

3) Exchange traders. Equities, unlike fixed-income products, trade on organized exchanges. The NYSE is one of them. The electronic NASDAQ is another. These guys broker stocks from large buyers and sellers, not unlike the institutional sales and trading people. Except these guys have to sit in small cramped spaces on the exchange and deal much more quickly. You know how these guys are -- they're the ones on the news.

4) Various forms of buy-side traders. These guys trade to make money for their own accounts. Buying low, selling high. Hopefully. They can be in hedge funds, some mutual funds, investment banks, and so forth. Contrary to popular belief, they don't shout too often, and most of the time the environment is more like a group of online gamers staring at their computer screens.

Now in addition to those guys, there are a lot of other stuff that goes on...

1) Investment bankers, in relevance to traders, do IPOs and then have the institutional salespeople go sell them. Sometimes, that also trickles down to the retail brokers.

2) Research analysts produce reports on stocks.

3) Modelers try to come up with new products, better model existing products, etc. These are derivative-linked things that is actually a whole world onto itself (like equity options).

Then there are a bunch of other guys who do other strange things --

There are, for example, "direct-access" trader companies who are basically guys trying to wring money out of the market by dabbling in it. Some of them use technology, others try to use other techniques. I don't know how well they do.

Then there are so-called financial planners, etc, they are really just retail brokers.

Getting into the institutional side of things as well as the major buy-side activities is hard. Hard not as in difficult to figure out, but rather hard as in there is no definite way to do it. Some kids who smoke pot all through college taking basket-weaving courses for credit manage to get in smoothly while that hard-core finance major who trades paid for college with his own hedge fund can't get in no matter how hard he knocks.

Well you definitely are in the right place, being close to NYC and all. That's where the majority of them are. Check with your college to see what internships are available. Also, apply online for some in investment banking or assisting a broker, financial planner, etc. The possibilities are endless.

Prepare to be worked very hard.