Q&A: Traditional AM (+back office to front office)

Question

Hi all,

Short bio:

Started out in Sell-side risk (back office) in Canada, really wanted to break into IB but couldn't - worked roughly 4 years
    Moved to buy-side ops (back office) in Canada coding and making lives of PMs and analysts better - worked a little over 1 year
    Posting came up in US equities team in US, a team a used to work a lot with and made cool tools for, reached out to PM and skipped through a lot of formal process but had interviews with 3 PMs in the team
    Currently relocated and working as an analyst specializing in energy, materials, real estate (YOE +1) whil

monkey d. · Accepted Answer

Sure.

Equities -

1. PDF scraping to build raw financial statements csv (10-Qs & 10-Ks) and remap to centralized line items

2. Build out financial model & allow UI to take in assumptions inputs and spit out valuation range

3. Macro sensitivities / Factor sensitivities per stock and agg. to portfolio; optimization, hypothetical rebalance case, scenario analysis on macro & factors

Fixed Income -

1. Build sector specific credit curves daily and highlight changes

2. In-house credit model (rating average, cash flow, coverage ratios)

3.

monkey d. · Answer

TLDR:

IB prep materials + coding skills (don't need a certification, just know how to use it - my source YouTube, stack overflow, gitlab)

My prep for IB when I was pursuing it was helpful. Although my team isn't value oriented we need to know the basics of modeling, excel, looking through 10Ks 10Qs on top of everything else. Added to that, my ticket to the opportunity was coding skills. I have working knowledge of python, sql, C#, html and used those to make cool tools for front office teams.

monkey d. · Answer

Current comp 150K all in

Buyside back office 75K to 100K all in

Sellside back office 55K to 95K all in

Difficult, visa takes a long time. Looking for places to rent while keeping the idea of staying permanently (green card hopeful) at the back of my mind. I'm also married and have a 1 year old son so have had a lot to consider before making the move.

monkey d. · Answer

Aside from having those skills, really focus on networking. I was extremely fortunate and I recognize my path is not conventional. Ideal candidate for fundamental investment teams would be from SS ER with 2~4 YOE in relevant sector. So you are competing with these guys. So your best bet is to work hard, try to be on projects that give you face time with the FO, and blow them away (or at least build a good rapport and relationship so if opportunity comes around they think of you)

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Q&A: Traditional AM (+back office to front office)

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Q&A: Traditional AM (+back office to front office)

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