PE Recruiting - Megafunds are starting
Good luck to all you first year analysts. Megafunds are all starting this week with interviews so hope you all are ready! Stay late tonight and review a few of the deals you've worked on...
Good luck to all you first year analysts. Megafunds are all starting this week with interviews so hope you all are ready! Stay late tonight and review a few of the deals you've worked on...
+41 | Boomerang from PE back to IB? | 6 | 2d | |
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+31 | Joining an exciting new Software Rollup over PE/ Growth Equity? | 24 | 1d | |
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+20 | Advice Needed: Starting Career at Smaller PE Firm | 6 | 1d | |
+20 | Autism in PE | 4 | 2d | |
+19 | PE BD/IR | 7 | 3d | |
+18 | PE offer — Post reference check waiting too long | 6 | 17h |
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Really? I thought they started summer 2012 recruiting in late April or early May.
KKR, BX, TPG, Bain and Crestview are confirmed thus far.
Double post
Yeah and General Atlantic, Lindsay Goldberg, Providence, Carlyle and a handful of others will be going over the next week or so
This doesn't seem accurate. I've met with multiple recruiters over the past few weeks and consensus was that Apollo would probably wait till April and everyone would follow shortly thereafter.
Sure, that was the consensus then, but Bain went ahead and pulled the trigger. Their interviews have already begun. I have mine soon.
Yeah BananaStand - it just means that you don't have interviews yet. I'm sitting next to first years who interviewed today / have interviews tomorrow morning.
This is madness. How the hell can people be confident in hiring kids with 2 months of training and 6 months of actual investment banking experience?
I thought April was early...now we're talking March. Probably means we'll start interviewing kids in April. Hopefully deal flow picked up enough in 2010 to improve the analyst class quality from where it was last year.
People exaggerate how much you learn in banking... If 8 months in you can't tell me what a good business is, the drivers of an lbo model, details of a deal / drivers of valuation/growth etc, what kind of companies make good LBO candidates, etc, then that's pretty pathetic. There's also the standard accounting/finance questions that you should have picked up by now. If you don't know how the 3 financial statements work by now, you probably won't in another 6 months either.
With some prep I bet you most of the good candidates could have interviewing 3 months ago. The process is certainly significantly more competitive, but you won't get that many "out of left field" questions and you can reasonably expect to answer most of them if you studied. Beyond that, the fit aspect isn't going to change whether you're 2 months or 2 years into banking. Either they like your personality or they don't.
Fucking Bain! Hordes and hordes of monkeys who are not fully prepared at the moment are freaking out.
bkm125, you're 100% right. I don't have any interviews because I already escaped banking. When I said I was talking to recruiters, I meant when I was getting a read on how we need to handle our hiring process here at my fund.
And yes, part of working at a middle-market PE fund is being involved in the recruiting process. Even when I was interviewing a couple of years ago, the megafunds weren't starting up until May.
Also, I agree that people exaggerate what you learn in banking, but I still think 8 months is too soon if you expect to hire someone who can think on their own. The most infuriating part of interviewing kids for the Associate position is when I ask them what they would personally invest in (if they managed a PE fund) and they automatically default to one of their banking clients.
To your point DMMSY, thankfully the market is insanely competitive. I think our hit rate was sub 5% (offers/resumes provided by headhunters).
First year at my boutique got Bain offer today.
Leonard Green is handing out offers this week as well... just to add to the list..
If you were not invited to any cocktail sections this past week or so, you are FUCKED..
God bless boutiques
you are not f*cked if you didn't get invited to cocktail sessions. most big funds don't even have cocktail sessions (bain does...or did). the big funds are interviewing now, though, and spots will be filled quick (although there will always be some spots that take a few rounds for the PE funds to fill).
Our HR department told us a week or two ago that we'd probably interview in May and then I got an email on Monday saying that we were starting this week.
This happens every year. The HR people at the big funds try to collude and agree that, "this year," they're going to hold off on interviewing until later and then someone jumps the gun and they all pile on early. Seems like it occurs earlier with every new year.
Good luck with the interviews homies. Study your deals!
No one is screwed, its early.
To your other point, boutiques always outperform on % basis... nothing new
You are kidding... right? Even a safety firm for our analysts - New Mountain Capital, will be wrapped up this week... These things come and go man.. its not college recruiting... you have 24 hours to prepare, 24 hours to interview and 24 hours to decide...
you can cut the pressure with a knife ...
Am I the only constantly insecure one? Or is any other pre-mba questioning what fund you're at, wondering if you made the right decisions a few years ago and whether the grass is greener? Well, if I hadn't accepted the offer and had held out for that next interview .... But my offer exploded in 24 hours, so ... However ... what if I could have pulled off....
Aghh: it'll spike your blood pressure every time. Goddam rat race.
Anyone else confirmed to have already begun interviewing?
Fuckin Bain, bastards. They should have just waited, would have given everyone a lot more time to work with.
reading this stresses me out and I am almost 7 years removed from the PE recruiting process. Luckily I have decent interviewing skills or I would have been completely effed....given that I started recruiting in february of my 2ND YEAR.
Analysts aren't screwed because they're too late, they're screwed because the odds are immensely against them. I think there are something like 1,500 1st years on the street this year (across a broad spectrum of banks, BBs, Boutiques, Regionals) and they're fighting amongst themselves and with another 1,000 or so second years for a few hundred spots.
If you assume there are 30 U.S. PE funds w $5B AUM+ and maybe 150 U.S. PE funds w/ $1B AUM+, then you're probably talking what 100 megafund jobs up for grabs and 300 total given that alot of funds are having trouble raising new funds and/or don't need more bodies right now?
does anyone here have some insight into how the process works in london?
I was about bring up the same topic.
Pieces of information I've picked up here and there: - The industry is less concentrated here (a lot of PE positions in other places than London) so there is a much more ad-hoc recruiting process than in the states given that funds will recruit when they need people. This means that hiring happens much closer to the start dates and often also for non-summer starts - I've heard of people getting offers in the late summer for a summer start the following year and I have heard of people getting offers less than a month before starting, both at top funds - Quite a bit of hiring seems to be focused on 3rd yr analysts / 1st year associates (makes some sense given that there is no two-and-out policy and that much fewer people go to business school - Often they are looking for particular languages etc which makes the potential applicant pool for each position smaller
Regarding specific funds I have not heard of anyone actually interviewing for summer 2012 yet and I work at a top bank in M&A - but I don't have perfect information obviously. Would be very interested in hearing if any of the US firms are interviewing for London already - I am pretty sure Bain for instance has not started (guy I know there told me so two weeks ago at least) but I may of course be wrong
How important is brand name vs being top rated?
The grass is always greener and there will always be someone else making more money than you (even at the same age). I'd always look at the overall package of what you're getting into. Trust me when I say that I have friends at some of the megafunds (and CompBanker could probably attest to this as well) and I would not trade places with them. Ever. I've taken to bitching about stupid things at work now and then but taking a step back, I realize how lucky I am to work at a firm that has good people, hands on experience for associates, and decent hours.
Finally, know that the rat race never stops unless you actively remove yourself from it. For some context, I have a buddy from a megafund applying to b-school this year. Tension has run super high at his fund because 1) lack of acceptances at the top b-schools and 2) very small number of return offers. It is super awkward. Definitely not a good way to spend your 20s...
If you assume there are 30 U.S. PE funds w $5B AUM+ and maybe 150 U.S. PE funds w/ $1B AUM+, then you're probably talking what 100 megafund jobs up for grabs and 300 total given that alot of funds are having trouble raising new funds and/or don't need more bodies right now?
There are way more than 30 funds with $5 plus AUM, look in the PEI 50 even the 50th one (30th in the US maybe) has ~$16 billion raised, unless you mean the most recent fund
Curious... which firms are having trouble raising new funds?
Warburg raised a $15 billion fund in the depths of the downturn, GS raised a $20 billion fund right before the downturn hit, BX just raised a $15 billion fund at the end of last year. From what I've gathered the problem isn't raising funds, its deploying the capital they've already raised. Markets are too hot, everything is fully priced... leverage levels are creeping up again... but not much you can do with an 11x valuation and market that will only bear 5-6x debt max, and thats assuming the total debt amount itself is sub-$5-6 billion.
EM funds in particular have struggled.
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Couldn't agree more (although i don't make anywhere close to 300k). I never work weekends unless something huge is happening and even then i might work for a few hours at most. The latest i usually stay during the week is 9-10 and I actually get to have my opinions heard on certain things in addition to living in exHell. No MF would ask my advice and actually take it on how much capital we should call and at what dates to make the calls.
Can't believe recruiting has already started (and offers have already been given) for summer 2012 starts. I'm just interviewing for summer 2011 starts now! And I'm a second year. Crazy.
I read it a little differently. I read that quotation to mean current middle-market funds are probably oversized relative to the size and quantity of deals available and, as a result, will be more likely to raise smaller funds in the future.
For example, if you're an existing MM fund with say a $300M Fund I, a $500M Fund II and a $700M Fund III, you manage $1.5B right now and produce $30 million of annual base management fees (let's leave carry out of the equation for now).
We'll assume Fund I is fully invested and Funds II and III are partially invested at this point, but unfortunately, you've found that quality middle market deals are either hard to find or insanely competitive, so you're investment pace ends up too light for the remaining $800M-$1B.
$1B of available equity capital probably means you're writing 10-15 $70M-$100M equity checks; however, deals in that size range are insanely competitive right now, so chances are you never fully deploy the capital.
So, next time you're fund raising, the market (and the GP, though the GP probably ignores reality) realizes you're probably only capable of deploying $500M of equity from a single fund. So, you're base management fees take a hit as you run off your larger funds and you're less inclined to expand your headcount given slower deal flow and lower AUM.
I'm not saying my example is true at every MM fund, but I do think it is an argument for why we'll see a number of MM PE funds dissappear of the coming 3-5 years.
That was a great explanation--thanks. What is a GP?
General Partner.
GP = General Partner LP = Limited Partner
Thanks Google
.
GP = KKR LP = Calpers
Also worth noting that the big institutional LPs need to allocate a certain value per year to PE, if they have $3bn to allocate its incredibly easy to give $400m to Blackstone, KKR, H&F etc whereas a $200m MM Fund is not going to allow them to be nearly 100% of their investor base, so its difficult to get a decent allocation.
As part of this, smaller LPs (family offices, HNW, FoF etc) are still struggling to put more money into PE when they have received fuck all distributions for the past three years (whilst the largest institutions will always have more money to deploy). These investors make up the bread and butter for MM funds, which are therefore struggling.
Conclusion - megafunds can raise money because theire LPs tend to be very unsophisticated and will allocate based on brand name (and the potential to get the cash off their asap quickly), rather than digging around to confirm if the manager is able to extract real value without the help of a shit load of leverage and bullish capital markets.
In terms of headhunting in London for PE, I have noticed in my limited experience (only working at one BB), that headhunters will target the top groups at top banks pretty early in the analyst's career for PE spots outside the UK (think Sweden, France etc...). Those getting headhunted for PE jobs IN London tend to have a minimum of 2 years experience before starting.
WSO is so ridiculously bias towards MM PE, its almost turned into a running joke now.
Its like Quantum or whatever his name was that trolled around shitting on NYC and championing the glory of Chicago.
This cracked me up.
I'm personally arguing that middle market PE (as a whole) has a long, tough road ahead relative to megafunds. I don't think I've said anything that would suggest I'm biased one way or the other. In fact, I'd probably argue that PE as a whole overpromises and underdelivers to LPs.
Sorry for the confusion. I'm not saying MM PE returns will necessarily suffer disproportionately relative to megafunds or other size bands.
Rather, I was talking about the fundraising environment, and, as a result, the diminished need for increased headcount.
My argument for the challenging MM PE fund raising environment is described in by previous comments and based on conversations with principals, partners, associates at my fund and with my peers at other funds.
.
Regarding the MF / MM debate, what are people's definitions here of megafunds and middle market funds? Are people saying the megafunds are just KKR, Carlyle, BX, Bain, TPG and maybe Apollo? What about firms like Apax, General Atlantic, Providence, CD&R, H&F, THL, etc? What is the cutoff for MF / MM?
If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck.
the majority of these firms are well into the recruiting process
the most general term for megafund is 12Bn+ globally ($19Bn+ in boom) in a vintage cycle
I would definitely not consider THL or GA as a MM firm... CDR I wouldn't quite call a megafund, nor would I call it a MM.
Its not really a science if you ask me. Reason being... most people call megafunds the ones with tens-of-billions under management where a single fund is $10+ billion. The term MM generally refers to smaller deals $500-1ish billion. Its also used for not sponsor companies to refer to any company thats not a large cap company.... so its kind of a term that equates to non-large-cap. In this case, MM is both. For a PE firm its a firm that targets the middle market (i.e. deals from $500mm to $1ish billion), and its also commonly used to describe a firm thats a non-megafund.
So just because a PE firm doesn't have a $15 billion fund, doesn't make it a MM fund (i.e. invests in $500mm to $1-ish billion companies). Its a pretty meaningless term. Its probably more intelligent to call a megafund a megafund, a MM PE firm one that invests exclusively in the middle market... I'd call CDR a private equity fund.
These labels really dont mean anything to anyone in the real world, and no one gets into a debate if THL is really a megafund or not except status-obsessed college kids and WSO monkeys (myself included).
Thanks for your thoughtful answer. Appreciate it
Also when people on here are talking about the merits of a MM PE experience, I'm assuming they're talking about a Wachovia Capital Partners, Macquarie Capital, Covington Investments or some other non-household name PE firm... they're not talking about working at CDR, Riverstone, Audax, Kelso and the like.
Correct me if I'm wrong.
I can't speak for others, but when I talk about MM PE, I'm thinking about fund size and most often thinking about funds with say $500M-$3B in AUM. It's an arbitrary cut-off, but it probably means the equity checks are $50M-$400M which would imply sub $1B buyouts.
And I'm not thinking about Wachovia/Macquarie when I think about MM PE funds.
I'm not even sure what to call Wachovia or Macquarie. For one, Wachovia Capital Partners, to my knowledge, doesn't even do control deals (primarily co-invests in larger deals, right?). I know nothing about Macquarie Capital Partners other than I've never seen them sniffing around any deals I've ever been a part of.
Was just making up examples to illustrate that the majority of the MM PE experience thats cited on WSO pertains to non-household name PE firms (or atleast thats my assumption, absent CompBanker or one of the others disagreeing, said Wach and MacQ because just because their banking business are household names, but their PE arm generally is not).
From what I've gathered it sounds like the MM PE monkeys on here work at smaller PE funds where there's maybe 1-2 dozen professionals, which dictates the nature of their role moreso than the size or nature of the investments made.
So if you think a Kelso/Audax/CDR experience will mimic what some of the MM PE monkeys on here describe, you may be in for a shocker.
That was my main point.
Since you mentioned Riverstone, I was wondering whether they already started recruiting? Does anyone have insight into compensation/lifestyle for Riverstone? I know they are a pure energy fund, and also an affiliate of Carlyle if I'm not mistaken. Thanks in in advance.
Somewhat on topic, searched but couldn't find anything...
How common is it to do a 3rd year as an analyst (possibly in a different industry group) to give yourself some time to consider whether you want to leave banking? If you do the 3rd year, are you signaling to your bank that you want to stick around? Not sure I'll be ready to jump into PE recruiting 6 months after starting the job...I've heard all the reasons why it's easy to leave but still not so sure.
Thanks
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