L/S analyst feeling stuck mid-career
Question is for fundamental L/S equity folks that got stuck mid-career and found a way to get unstuck.
Basically I'm at a stage where I can do the "business analysis" or "ditch-digging" as someone else described on another thread. It's a skillset that's worth $300k-$400k, maybe $500k at best. (You can get that with better r/r doing something else.)
But to push past that level in L/S, I agree you need to be making calls, taking risk, being a moneymaker. And to do that you need to find your own novel way/insight of making money, that's what I imagine the good PMs do. I never got to watch/learn from a good one up close.
I never quite developed that "moneymaking" gene with enough longevity - periods of success I'm wondering if they were luck not skill, and even if they were skill then the game changed and it no longer works.
So to the PMs that found yourselves stuck similarly but found a way to push past it and re-find your moneymaker gene, can you share about your journey and what helped you push through to the other side? I look at myself and think fk, I'm old, I should have figured this out by now and there's literally nothing I can do that some 26 year old can't.
You need a sleeve and take risk asap. Figure out why you haven’t been given one. If no reason and you are motivated, move on to the next gig.
How old are you (or YOE in L/S equity) and MM or SM?
6-ish years total across MM and SM. Both PMs tanked.
Why did both of the PMs tank?
They lost money
Start trading a paper portfolio (easy to do on bloomberg or certain brokers) and take it seriously. Tracking your own performance is a great motivator and might give you the push you need. If it goes well, it will also give you the confidence to pursue a real sleeve or PM role.
Thanks - def not lacking in motivation. I want to figure this out, obsessively so. But on a cold streak/slump and not sure where/how to fix, so looking for anecdotes on how others have dealt with it.
So you are not required to have a view on anything on the job? If so, start having views on everything:
Yeah, have done all that. Successfully for stretches in the past. The thing is when you hit a slump you wonder "was I just a lucky idiot all those times" and "how do I fix my game going forward".
I can play the quarter blocking and tackling game about average. More so trying to figure out getting good at situations like Anomaly being long LW in size in 2022 (mentioned on the other thread).
No one can predict anything with 100% certainty. What matters is betting the most when you’re most confident about the outcome and therefore maximizing profits and minimizing bet sizing when you’re least confident to minimize downside risks and losses.
It’s always easy to want more but just remember that you’re already in the top 1% by making $400k/year. If you’re confident that you can always get this job back after taking a risk in a PM job then go for the jump. Definitely possible you could fail, but if falling back to your current role is the worst case scenario then you really don’t have much to lose. However, if leaving will make it impossible to regain your current role then you definitely will need to consider if the potential upside is worth the risk of the downside (ie lower compensation in the future).
Link to thread?
Your concern is kind of core to the job of a money manager. Many people have devoted their lives to this, but I'll try to offer two suggestions:
1. Get extra rigorous about differentiation. Can you prove that you are differentiated? Who is on the other side of your trade? Why are they making that trade? Try to quantify how differentiated you are. Get obsessive about it. Try to put yourself in situations where your unique experience gives you a higher probability of being both differentiated and correct. You probably already do this, but do it more.
2. Get extra rigorous about thesis validation. Constantly check and re-check for thesis validity. Quantify thesis risk/reward. Ask yourself what could go wrong or do a hypothetical post-mortem: assuming this did poorly, why did it play out that way? Will this thesis affect the 1-2 key drivers of stock performance? If the thesis is airtight, you might still lose but you should lose less and the losses should be less painful.
It can also help to do counterfactuals in addition to post-mortems: if you looked at a trade and didn't do it when you should have, why didn't you do it? Single-stock people can get lost in the minutiae of their names, so it never hurts to go back to basics and make sure your process is buttoned up.
Could you link to the 'ditch-digging' thread please
https://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forum/hedge-fund/pod-shop-hate-discussi…
Any chance that you're just tripping yourself up / overthinking it?
I don't have amazing sounding variant perceptions on the stocks where I make the most $. I worked for someone that didn't really have it down, it just kind of clicked for me in year 3. Takes longer if the guy you work for doesn't have a working system obviously. I had to learn what not to do, etc.
The OG
Possibly this. I'm trying to pivot from (A) the mindset of playing for 5% pops around earnings on a 2-3% position, to (B) finding these "double over 12 months" where we can build a 10% position, like LW.
I've been historically decent at (A) but that alone doesn't move the needle when the PM has multiple 10% positions down 50%. I needed to be good at (B) to save the fund, and also feel like someone good at (B), a "moneymaker", is rarer and more valuable than (A).
Although it sounds like this isn't an option, have you considered moving shops? Maybe the answer to your question lies somewhere else. The calculus also changes meaningfully if your goal is to learn how to take risk to dig your current shop out of a hole.
Nothing makes LPs happier than when people start swinging for the fences to save a sinking fund. You should just go somewhere else? It doesn't need to be your problem.
hear you. (B) is harder to have a large sample size on. I track hit rate on these too.
Start managing money and risk. And don’t repeat the pattern of joining a PM who could blow up (tougher one, I know).
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