Investment Consulting with CFA - what are the exit opportunities?
One possible career path I am exploring is to work as an Investment Consultant at one of the insitutional advisors/brokers (Aon, Willis Towers Watson, Mercer) and complete the CFA qualification. Much of the work will be advising pension funds on their investment strategy, governance, asset allocation and which investment manager they should use. There might be some direct delegated investment decisions which I will get involved in through the fiduciary portfolio management area of work. So I could be doing research into specific assets and Asset Manager type activities. But I think most of the research work will be focussed on the investment manager in the market - finding the right ones for the client to invest their money in.
What are likely exit opportunities from this career + CFA qualification? I'm particularly interested opportunities in Asset Management buy side, Equities Research and Investment Banking.
What's the comp look like?
Definitely not as good as IB or PE.
Around 60k base and 15-20 % bonus.
CFA will not help with IB.
Investment consulting IS the exit for AM, not the other way round
Exit opportunities include endowments/ foundations. Working for the firms listed will not get you into ER/ IB. There is no crossover in skill set. Your only chance would be a M7 mba.
I don’t think you need to rule out ER if you can spend time networking and crafting a stock pitch. You don’t have fundamental analysis skills but you have an analytical framework you probably built in your role. On top of that, the CFA should carry some weight. You probably won’t get into a BB ER spot but maybe try for a smaller shop? You can go to an AI shop, join a family office, you can join a bank in the asset management arm, there is institutional consulting at wealth management firms…or you do an MBA and pivot with more of a sure path.
The institutional sales side of things can be really lucrative if you close allocation deals between big clients and big fund managers but takes awhile to get into those seats. Not sure about consulting but imagine it’s tied to your book of business and client assets.
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