Working at either Yale or Stanford's Investment Office - Opportunity to work as an analyst?

How good is an opportunity to work at an investment office as an analyst at one of the top endowments? Say getting to work at Yale (with David Swensen) or at Stanford (with John Powers)? How does this compare to working for a top hedge fund (D.E. Shaw, etc.), PE Firm (Blackstone, etc.), or top BB IBD Group (GS TMT, GS FIG, MS M&A, etc.) out of undergrad? Thx.

12 Comments
 

As far as I know Swensen farms all of the endowment out to other managers -- some very large chunk to Farallon. Swensen's best in class at what he does, but it seems like this would be a tremendous opportunity for someone interested in, and otherwise considering, fund of funds jobs, not for someone who wants to advise on M&A and capital raising (go BB) or take companies private (bstone).

 

no I def wouldn't want to do that FT. But for an internship it would be great. working in a purely academic environment always blunts your earning potential- all those liberals would try to come down on anybody making more than mid six figures.

 
Best Response

It is good experience / resume fodder for an undergrad but bad for full time. I know people who have done this at both Yale / Stanford (and elsewhere).

The problem with it is that at the end of the day these shops outsource their work to other managers... so you are really just doing fund of funds management which is like due diligence, portfolio rebalancing, etc. You will learn much more as a proprietary trader, private equity investor, or even IBD than at a fund of funds investment office since you are much more directly involved in investment decisions and don't outsource the work.

BB IBD, Private Equity, Hedge Fund, Proprietary Trading, etc are generally all better for FT. The hours are nice though.

 
dabears432It is good experience / resume fodder for an undergrad but bad for full time. I know people who have done this at both Yale / Stanford (and elsewhere).

The problem with it is that at the end of the day these shops outsource their work to other managers... so you are really just doing fund of funds management which is like due diligence, portfolio rebalancing, etc. You will learn much more as a proprietary trader, private equity investor, or even IBD than at a fund of funds investment office since you are much more directly involved in investment decisions and don't outsource the work.

BB IBD, Private Equity, Hedge Fund, Proprietary Trading, etc are generally all better for FT. The hours are nice though.

Thanks for the insight. Would you recommend MM or BB IBD for a sophomore summer over Yale/Stanford if there's a good chance of BB IBD in junior summer regardless?

 

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