Molecular Bio Researcher Interested in "research" at a hedge fund
I don't want to be redundant on this form, but I'm a pre-med student doing neuro research going into my senior year. I go to a T20 school and my friends in finance are urging me to try to reach out to hedge funds to do "research" since they know I'm interested in healthcare investing / I like to read writeups they send me. I guess my post is really just trying to figure out a couple things
1) How do I learn more about what they're talking about
2) Is it even possible for me to work at these hedge funds? I have pretty much no financial experience, only research papers and a good MCAT score
To break into hedge funds with your background as a molecular biology researcher, here’s what you need to know:
Learning More About Hedge Fund Research:
Is It Possible for You to Work at Hedge Funds?:
While your lack of direct financial experience may be a hurdle, your unique background can be an asset if you position yourself effectively.
Sources: Q&A: 3rd Year Hedge Fund Analyst, Hedge Fund Careers: Getting a Hedge Fund Job Out of Undergrad and Beyond, Healthcare Overview... Part 1?, Hedge Fund Careers: Getting a Hedge Fund Job Out of Undergrad and Beyond
Every other week there is a young gun like yourself who comes on here to ask these incredibly basic questions about what it is hedge funds do and whether you can eventually work for them. The answer usually is, given the fact that you have not demonstrated an ability to avail yourself of the free knowledge on this subject that is extremely, widely accessible on the Internet and made even triply more accessible with AI tools, a resounding no. Always very funny to me when someone who's purportedly a "researcher" cannot go and research the questions he has before coming to a forum to ask elementary grade questions. C'est la vie, oh to be young again...
So I can admit the question was not the best, but my main point was trying to figure out what they meant by research. I've learned later on that what they were referring to was proprietary research, which you're right could have been answered by a chatbot. Regardless, there's a reason why this website has a terrible rep because you can't even let someone with zero hours dedicated to finance ask a basic question. Yes, there are free online resources and AI tools, but one resource that's as old as the internet has always been online chat forums. Also, I don't give a shit about finance and really just want to make money during my gap year to medical school. Also, I don't waste my time researching ape-like topics such as finance which spends most of its time on arbitrage and insider speculation as opposed to trying to do something that actually provides value.
Sir this is a Wendy’s. Yeah you’re not interested at all in finance, which is why you posted on a finance forum. As we all know, finance is only for society bottom feeders who don’t provide any value. Unlike physicians, most of whom provide extreme value by delivering healthcare that is on average worse than what a well-trained OpenEvidence/Claude agent could provide because they are medical society guideline execution monkeys devoid of critical thinking skills.
It would seem as if the lack of oxygen on your high horse is starting giving you delusions of grandeur. The MD diploma collecting dust on my parents’ living room wall says you should humble your scrawny teenage ass and get a fucking clue. All the fancy, shiny drugs whose pivotal readouts you undoubtedly jerk off to on the cover pages of NEJM JAMA JACC wouldn’t exist without hedge funds like mine bearing the risk of investment. My PM’s old fund shepherded one of the first JAKis through clinical development. Maybe you’ll understand what I mean when you reach for Rinvoq to treat your stress-induced IBD as you make your way to Heaven as a US trained physician, the only job in the world that provides value to society.
You call yourself a “researcher” but you’re in undergrad. You cant call yourself that with the weight it holds unless you’re genuinely in the industry or doing an MD or PhD (this is coming from someone who did research in undergrad as well).
You’re not doing the type of diligence or critical thinking that hedge funds are looking for. Do IB or get an MD (or PhD), as these are the only options you have at the moment to break in (though senior year is too late for IB I guess). You could shotgun some applications to family offices too, but I think it’s better served building a solid base instead of drifting around non-established places
I definitely can call myself a researcher with two pubs. But yeah, I agree the question was bad and lacked critical thinking, it was mainly a throw away because I don't have hours to sink into something that I can just try to assess on a forum. Regardless, thank you for the advice and if you have any good resources for where to just start learning that'd be much appreciated as well.
You fckin premeds are unbearable. “with my two pubs” jfc I’d bet both my left and right nut that you aren’t anywhere close to even second author on either of them and at least one of them you are only on cuz you got buddy buddy with the post doc over the summer. Congrats Mr. Researcher you can now waltz into the Touro College of Medicine with your 8th author group publication, which was a meta-analysis of retrospective cohort data from the 2000s in The Lancet Journal for Interdisciplinary Bariatric Surgical Outcomes
Here, I’ll do you a favor:
1 - you seem like an insufferable clueless twit, if you want help put in some effort on your own to research and then put in some effort to stomach the ribbing. finance like medicine is really apprenticeships unless if you are a rare figure who charts your own way from a college dorm room, deal with it or self select out
2 - stocks move based on news and catalysts. the biggest catalysts in biotech deal with clinical trials. learn what moves stocks on your own, and think of reasons why someone might be able to do better than the market at predicting what happens. remember that the market is the sum intelligence (or stupidity) of the crowd and don’t be so cocky as to assume the whole market is clueless. where can one generate edge? if you have an answer you’ll be on your way to understanding how. there is no right answer but there are certainly a few recognized and repeatable ways of generating alpha
by the way, sovaldi saved a lot more lives than a generation of harvard med school grads. your heuristic of value in society is probably off by orders of magnitude.
good luck.
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