Noticed quite a few questions regarding FoF on here recently (probably due to recruiting cycle) so thought a thread might be helpful - no PMs if possible.
My background is non-traditional. I'm from the UK, top 10(ish) university, finance degree, joined one of the biggest UK asset managers and completed 18 months of a trainee programme before jumping shop to PE FoF. Majority of my fellow associates have more tradional backgrounds (oxbridge, IBD) so can answer questions from what I know of their backgrounds.
Obviously FoF investing isnt for everyone and the majority on here are more interested in being a GP rather than LP, but hopefully there'll be some interest -please ask away
My time is spent as follows:
Primary Fund DD / modelling / meetings / reference calls / legals - 50% Annual LP meetings / travelling to meet FMs 20% Coinvests / Secondaries opps analysis 25% Boring admin shit 5%
I focus a lot of my attention on EM, but have also worked on mezz, us/eu buyout, frontier and growth capital so have a reasonable understanding across strategies
I'll assume the first question is comp so will get that out of the way....my base is £75k and bonus (excluding carry as we are not currently at our preferred return) was £30k - which I am told was very low compared to better years.
Thought a day-in-the-life would be helpful.
As previously mentioned, I spend a lot of time out of the office, but a standary office day would be as follows (this is based on last friday).
8.00am -8.30am Arrive in the office, read emails that came in overnight from Asia / US, try and follow-up with people in HK / BJ asap before they head home for the day.
8.30am-9.00am Skim through FT, WSJ, bloomberg etc to see if there is anything interesting on any of our underlying portfolio companies.
9.00am - 9.45am Call with CFO of one of our GPs to discuss co-invest opportunity in a med tech company. Go step-by-step through their models and question their assumptions and compare with my initial model - usually my earnings growth estimates are significantly more conservative and I need to be 'up-sold'.
9.45am - 10am Discuss call with one of our principles, both feel that we have plenty of healthcare in the portfoio and this doesnt pass our >3x MOIC for serious consideration of a co-invest.
10am-11am Managing Partner of a Indian Mezz Fund who is raising $250m comes in to talk us through the proposal. Past funds have done well but we have signficant concerns about the risk/reward for EM mezz. Meeting focuses on quality of management in these businesses and there disinclination to give away sizeable equity stakes.
11am-12pm Writing up some meeting notes from earlier in the week and sending a few post-meeting DD emails
12.30-14.00pm Lunch presentation at a hotel from one of the US megafunds currently raising $8bn. I hate the strategy, the lack of decent exits and the fact that these businesses are highly skilled marketers rather than highly skilled investors. We wont invest but its good to know what the competitors are looking at. Megafunds are good for people like CALPERS who need to write $500m cheques and investors who rely on consultants for their DD, but for more niche / adventorous players they are not very exciting.
14.30-15.00 Internal meeting to look at our pipeline and discuss travel arrangements. We have three LP meetings in one week in NYC in two weeks time and I'll be attending, always enjoy travelling but these meetings will be exhausting
15.00-16.00pm Reference calls will existing investors in a fund that is about to have its final close. These are probably the best way of getting to know a new manager. On this occasion no new issues arise and we will proceed with our legal review.
16.00-18.00pm emails, meeting notes, bit of modelling but its friday so I'm concentrating on the weekend rather than the work. Leave at 6pm and drink for the rest of the weekend.
Hope that's helpful.