I was a trader in the City 10 years ago – and then, in the space of a day, I lost everything

A little over 10 years ago, I had finished school and moved to London to embark on a financial career in the City. While my friends went off to various universities, I found a job as a trainee on a trading floor. I loved every minute of it. Working in that sort of environment keeps you on your toes constantly. The atmosphere was inspirational.

After being at the firm for a year, I successfully passed my financial exams and was given more responsibility in the office. I was very proud of the job I had and very much enjoyed going to work each day. My friends and family were all extremely supportive, and I was looking forward to building my career. I had no reason to believe that I wouldn’t have my job for life.

Then the credit crunch happened.

Within the space of a morning, I went from having what looked like a promising career in the City to having no job and ultimately no means of paying for the house I lived in. I was let go as soon as the recession hit.

As misfortune would have it, two months prior to this I had signed a contract to rent a house with two other people, one of whom also lost their job in the same week.

If I’m being honest, the house was probably a little beyond our means – but we were young and our careers were seemingly going well so we decided it was worth paying a bit more for the right place. After all, we were safe in stable jobs and thought we could expect promotions and pay rises in the future.

That changed in an instant when two of us lost our incomes. We had little to no option other than to move out and just hope the consequences would not be too severe. By the end of the week, we had packed up our belongings and moved back to our respective family homes.

Everything happened so quickly that I had no time to compute what I should do. But as one does and with the helpful advice of my family, I eventually picked myself up and tried to figure out what it was that I wanted to do next.

As well as a career in finance, I had always aspired to become an entrepreneur and this unexpected change in my plans left me with the time and space to that. While working to pay the bills during the day, I spent the evenings teaching myself how to code websites and crafting a business plan for a comparison site.

A website seemed the obvious choice for me as it was an opportunity to create a business with minimal outlay. With all manner of information at your fingertips on the internet and a desire to build an online business, it’s just a matter of putting in the time to teach yourself new skills. There was no question of me being able to return to banking as the entire sector was depleted and in chaos, so that path seemed like the smartest one to go down.

Ten years on, it’s now safe to say I am pleased that my career in finance was cut short and I was instead given the opportunity to run my own business – but I still consider myself lucky to have worked in the City, however short my time may have been there.

Michael Foote is a former trader and the founder of comparison site Quote Goat