Should i apply to SM HF for a first summer Analyst position from a UK super target(LSE) in london.
I'm a first-year student at LSE (UK) with a strong interest in public markets and long-term plans to break into the buyside. I'm currently exploring summer internship opportunities for 2026 and was wondering:
Has anyone here interned at or applied to single-manager hedge funds (SM HFs) in London as a first-year?
How realistic is it to land one of these roles early on?
Any advice on specific firms that offer structured (or even unstructured) first-year programs?
What kind of experience or technical prep would make a first-year applicant stand out?
Super target lmfao
right lol, the UK is a fraction of the size of the US, "super target" just doesn't mean as much in London when there's only really 5-6 schools worth going to for high finance anyway.
and even if you were referring to a "super target", it wouldn't be LSE, but rather Oxbridge/Imperial because they're highly represented despite every second person not wanting to work in finance.
My understanding is these firms have very small teams in London. Definitely nothing structured. Can imagine that some might have offcycle interns (one per team) but the expectation would likely be 6+ months and strong prior experience (essentially a few high quality internships and strong academics).
Just to give you an example, if there’s a guy who did LSE bachelor and is doing an HEC master (which for some programmes has a gap year in year 2) and he already had internships at JPM and Cinven, I could then imagine a place like Farallon might take him for a 9 month internship. And ideally this candidate would somehow demonstrate an interest in public markets, maybe through a uni society.
Maybe I am being too demanding here, but I think interns are generally quite slow and make a lot of mistakes. So if you’re not looking to hire them full-time afterwards, the bar is very high for them to be value-add.
In terms of actionable advice for you and others:
Your best option would be if you knew someone (friend of a friend maybe) there who could refer you and importantly tell you when they are looking.
You can try to connect with some people at these funds on Linkedin, try to do a short call to get some advice and if you leave an impression they will remember you if they ever search for an intern.
You can apply to any positions you find advertised on your career portal / linkedin, not sure if there are many.
You could maybe try to reach out to some headhunters but assume you wouldn’t get much traction.
Finally you could try to reach out to people’s work emails (which maybe you can guess / find somewhere). Please note your email is basically spam so don’t expect a reply, but if you attach a CV people will probably open it out of curiosity. Chances are if you have any weird hobbies, a snip of it might get sent around to their work colleagues for a laugh. But if they are actually looking at any point and your CV is strong, they might get back to you.
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