Portfolio Manager after MBA?
In general, let say you want to do investment management (in mutual fund or HF) after B school, what are some possible positions that you can take? Junior portfolio manager? Please name a few. Thanks
The front office of most funds really only has three positions.
Top to Bottom
CIO/Head dog/Bad Ass/Dumb but i started this thing so screw you etc PM (variety of sectors, funds, etc) Analyst (variety of sectors, funds, etc) ---- Trader usually on the level with analyst depending on the size of fund and strategy employed. If it's relatively small, analyst might do the small amount of trading necessary. Or, if it's basic long/short, the trader is often just executing the PM's commands and typically doesn't command a great deal of respect. If it's a more complex strategy, then the trader's skill is much more relevant (risk arb-event driven/ global macro/converts et al) and their power more substantial
The problem is that unless you have previous relevant experience, most funds, even those with a lot of money, don't have the capacity to train someone who doesn't have anything beyond an academic understanding. So unless it's a huge fund (bridgewater, fido, wellington, lots of mutual funds) there probably isn't MBA recruiting per se. The latter case is also the only time I've seen a "junior portfolio manager" title (alliance bernstein comes to mind). Even those who do recruit MBA's will often want a CFA along with it (or instead) or at least progress towards it (except for trading).
Upside is, due to the lack of HR at most firms, networking can get you a lot further, a lot faster, than in many industries.
Obviously everywhere is different but having had clients at 70-100 hedgies and mf's, ranging from $50mm to $10b. that's been my experience.
At larger firms that do MBA recruiting, I've only seen them recruit for analysts (or marketing/"product management" roles). Most larger firms that have centralized research pools have a perpetual problem with making research a real "career" - everyone wants to jump to the portfolio management side.
I know one guy who wound up as a kind of "assistant" or "associate" PM at a long/short shop (couple hundred million, but I think the fund he works on is $50-100mm). right after b-school, but he had about 4 years of buy-side trading plus 2 years doing research on high yield. Even then, I don't think was really pulling triggers until maybe 6 months or so into the job.
Thanks a lot. People on this forum are very helpful. Just curious - why isn't research a real career? Also, I read some older posts, and people said that some exit opportunities for research are going to HF or MF. If a research guy/gal enters HF or MF, is that person going to do research again in those funds?
I'm a career switch and going to b school this fall. I'm thinking about going into equity research to begin with; therefore, CFA doesn't work for me now.
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