Banking to Macro

Currently mm IB M&A, want to go to a macro fund eventually. Wondering what the best move for me is…

Lateral into a structured product or fx desk? Lateral upstream in groups? Go back to Business school?

What are some good books to read on macro strategies

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Know some folks in macro. They universally come from a liberal arts background focusing on things like government/poli sci. Not all of them go to grad school, however, and I’ve seen people break in from STEM degrees lately as well.

If you can get your banking experience to connect well with the fund’s alignment you have a shot. Some intangibles I’d consider also include foreign studying experience and the amount of languages you know. Having heard stuff about Bridgewater they also tend to select people with quirky ideas and a profound understanding of the world. This is probably their way to “hedge” because having people whose outlooks radically differ from the mean can lead to idea generation that dominates the Pareto distribution of returns.

Demonstrating thorough capability in research is emphasized along with comprehension and relative passion for the subject matter.

Take what I say with a grain of salt though, since this subset of the finance world is pretty clandestine and has been for me at least until Ray Dalio began his ascent to influencer stardom. I haven’t seen any empirical evidence for this, but I think if you want to go to grad school a JD/MBA or something outside of the conventional business path would help set you apart. Consider if you’d fit into an MPP or something as well. The best way to lateral like that though is more work experience in a relevant field, and continuing to interview for the roles you want yourself while collecting a better understanding of what they’re looking for.

Hope this was helpful, I’ve been intrigued by macro investing as well for a bit.

 

Know people in macro/research/strats and they generally come from econ/financial econ backgrounds, often with Masters too. Don’t know that many from random liberal arts backgrounds but that does seem to be a thing at Bridgewater where their Daily Obs are more… narrative than technical.

Rates would be the best bet into macro since you’d be studying central banks like a hawk (hah) and understanding fixed income which is a huge part of the macro channel.

 

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