Hey guys, I have a bit of an unusual situation so I'd love some input. I will be working full-time at MB
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First, huge congrats on landing MBB out of undergrad. That is insanely difficult, so you should be proud of yourself.
A couple of thoughts.
You're correct that MBB>PE is more plausible than HF, but it's still not too common. Aside from Bain Capital, PE firms overwhelmingly prefer ex bankers. This is not to say that the transition is not possible, but you would need to work on specific projects dealing with PE firms and corporate finance. You don't really get a choice on which projects you get staffed on, so hopefully you're in a city that has a lot of finance projects.
Fred Alger is a great mutual fund. If your interest really is investing, there is no reason to turn down ER at a solid fund for banking.
Many thanks for the response :) Luckily I'll be in the NY area so finance projects shouldn't be hard to come by.
But if PE firms overwhelmingly prefer ex-bankers, wouldn't Citi FSG be preferable for previous experience?
PE and HF are different beasts. Although they are both buyside, the latter is much more about deep dive research into companies/industries/economic while the former is more about operations and diligence. I'm generalizing of course, but if your long-term goal is to do equity research at a top hedge fund or mutual fund, I don't see why you would take Citi FSG over doing actual equity research at a respectable fund. I went to a top MBA program, and the ex-bankers wanted to do buyside research. The only advantage of Citi FSG is that it will give you a wider transferable skillset, so that it sets you up for say corporate development, strategy, PE.
It ultimately depends on how serious you are about investing as a career.
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