Structured Finance Exit Opportunities
Realistic exits from Structured Products / ABS / Esoteric Finance groups?
I’m looking at structured products, ABS and esoteric finance teams at banks and trying to understand what the realistic exits actually are.
At some banks, these teams sit within IBD, while at others they sit under Global Markets or Structured Finance. Does that distinction materially affect exit opportunities?
My main concern is getting pigeonholed into a very narrow part of credit. Are the most common buyside exits essentially CLO, ABS or structured-credit funds, or is it realistic to move into broader direct lending, private credit, opportunistic credit or special situations?
It seems like the work should provide transferable skills: cash-flow modelling, downside analysis, understanding collateral and capital structures, and in some cases underwriting the underlying business rather than only analysing a pool of assets. Would that experience be viewed as relevant for direct lending or more traditional corporate-credit investing?
I’m also curious how difficult it would be to move further away from credit entirely. Is there any realistic path from one of these groups into an equity hedge fund, or private equity, or would recruiters generally see the experience as too specialised?
I’m interested in the space and my background has led to it, but I don’t want to enter a track that effectively closes the door to equities or more generalist investing after a few years. Would appreciate hearing from anyone who has worked in these groups or seen where analysts and associates have exited.
to my understanding there's no corporate valuation being done in these seats so your exit opps will be limited to other structured products/securitization seats. unless you do one year here and lateral into a levfin/coverage group you won't be able to get to vanilla direct lending or anything opportunistic
I’ve met with most ABS/ABF groups at banks and am starting to meet with sponsors.
I would say: If it’s your first shop, focus on BB institutional seat where you get your 79,63,7. That will make you marketable everywhere broadly. It also means you will be client facing and involved on agent transactions.
Your fear is well rooted. However it’s a lot easier to go from ABS to direct lending than the other way around. If you start at a mega shop you can make your way down market easier
I have been in structured products for a decade and there are no "exits" except to buyside structured finance / ABF / ABS seats. However the good news is you won't want to leave b/c structured products has the best comp to stress ratio in front office finance while also being reasonably intellectually interesting. No comp isn't like rainmaker in M&A but its a glide path to $750-1.5mm total comp while not working more than like 50-60 hours a week doesn't get much better than than.
Hi, is there much difference in BB structured products vs MM (HSBC,Nomura, RBC)?
I'm considering targeting this as my niche for recruiting next year.
What you really want in this seat is a lot of flow (which means balance sheet) and/or a firm that embraces doing funky structures. I would say these are a reasonable selection non-exhaustive of decent spots to be -- BofA/JPM/Citi/MS/GS/Nomura/BNP/Scotia/DB/Barcap/Mizuho
So banks like HSBC,RBC, etc, aren't as attractive? I assumed these two would've been pretty decent giants.
Do you have any insight into JPM/BNP/DB? I am certain I can get referrals into those - also HSBC/RBC (why I mentioned).
guggenheim has a great team as well. one of the top players in the esoteric space. So does Barclays
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