Jumping from HF to AM
Anyone have any experiencing jumping from HF to AM for senior roles? Having been in a good quant research position for quite a while and is now considering jumping from HF to AM for a senior role(like a director or managing director etc). Not sure whether it is feasible so if anyone has a similar experience or any suggestions, I will be very grateful.
It will really depend on how your current firm is structured (your responsibilities, etc) and what you are looking for in the new role (and how the AM firm works). I realize this is very vague, but it is because “senior” in AM/HF can mean so many things. You could be a portfolio manager who is “senior” because you run a lot of AUM and have a few analysts working for you, or you could be running a whole department/large team (in the AM space) and even the “MD” title can be confusing (as some places just use it as a proxy for comp).
What would be helpful is trying to understand what you are looking to do at an AM firm and why you are looking to make the switch. In general being a “good” quant won’t be directly transferable. The senior roles are looking for people who are going to form internal and external relationships (I.e. figure out the “strategy” of the firm and connect internally to make this happen), can run large teams, can sell, basically can run the business (budgets for people and product, headcount, development paths, vendor contracts, technology investment, etc). That isn’t something that is usually picked up at a quant HF, but that’s why getting more clarity on what you are looking to do (and what you currently do) would be helpful.
Thanks a lot for your response. I strongly agree that a quant position even in a good company doesn't mean the skills are transferable to AM. That's why I am asking for further advice.
Current role is alpha research using various datasets and risk analysis. I am kind of bored with a PM type of role targeting at PnL because 1. job security and 2. most of the efforts are greedy and short term targeted. I noticed that places like GMO and Blackrock have people jumping to typical quant firms like Citadel and also the other way around. I am not sure how is life at AM looks like and will appreciate any lights on the AM side(Is it also high job risk + short term targeted? AM also have "portfolio manager" and are these roles similar?)
So I work on the HF side but know many people on AM and also considered the switch. From what I learned (through conversations and interviews):
1) job security is better on the AM side
2) time horizon will tend to be longer
3) pay will be lower but more stable
4) you will have more restrictions/rules, I.e. don’t expect to be able to trade anything you think is a good opportunity
5) at the senior levels (outside of maybe just a pure PM, but as an MD) be prepared to be involved in a lot more of strategy/direction of the firm, so I would say a 50/50 split of actually thinking about markets and thinking about the future of AM and how to build out products.
Hope this helps.
Thanks for the info. That helps a lot. In terms of the interview, does the AM side welcomes a senior researcher in quant hf? Will there be a gap between the skills needed?
Hit or miss, I would say generally will give you a chance with an interview, but I would imagine (lower confidence on this) that the role will be comp’d a bit lower than you are looking for. If you run a team, a reasonably sized portfolio, and are a bit more plugged into “running the business” then I think you have a better shot at a senior role. If not they’ll view you as an expensive individual contributor, and all that you bring (quant on shorter term strategies) isn’t really that useful to them.
That makes a lot of sense. A "running the business" role seems more important than the reputation of the company.
One more question, I heard that a director level or a PM level would be around 500k. That sounds decent. Do you expect this number to be true?
Yes definitely (as an all in number). For an “MD” position it will be higher. This is talking about the major AM firms and in the “FO” (as much as I hate that term) roles. You can see 7 figures at the senior director/MD level.
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