QR at Pod

Could anyone give insights into fair comp for a QR in a pod? Currently in a fixed income pod with 5 years experience at about 500k total (not formulaic). Feel slightly underpaid, but also have pretty good WLB overall. Does anybody have insight on where mid level QR comp should be at multi Strats?

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It comes down to what kind of role you are playing in your pod. Are you a QR for a discretionary PM running some sort of Fixed Income RV stuff? Well then its a coin flip whether you are doing actual alpha research or just responsible for all the tech support such as getting data, building curves, building dashboards, and so on. If you are doing the latter 500k is probably fair TC because you cant push for a pnl cut and if your PM is not one of the big ones there is little room to grow in comp terms.

If you are an alpha generation and dont have a cut thats a different question. If you alpha is genuine and scalable and you are a sound QR overall the big MMHFs can easily pay a successful quant 7 figures with 5 yoe. If you have more details about what kind of role you have in your team feel free to share

 

Unfortunately I am currently in the latter, and would like to move to the former. Do you think there is really much upside in trying to aim for more comp in my current role at another pod, or do QRs in this type of role plateau in comp and do I need to just try to move to a systematic role?

 

ultimately it always comes down to this: if there is no way to attribute a pnl number to your work you are likely to get screwed. there are of course generous pms that will recognize your work and pay you well but because of the information assymetry during the interview process you will never be able to label a pm generous in advance. so you have 2 options: either ask you boss for a small sleeve to run your stuff to practice at first or move to a systematic place. I think trying to ask your boss for a small risk allocation is a good idea, he knows you and might be willing to give you a shot.

 

Do you have any recommendations on how to move to a systematic fund?

 

You lose WLB and stability for higher comp. At this point in my career, I'd stay, but if you want to push for more, then yeah going for more alpha is a good idea. I'd say either try and propose more strats, or move to a systematic pod/firm where the researchers are the alpha generators. 

 

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