Asset Management Salary and Lifestyle

You're not going to make the big bucks with a 9-5 job, that's for damn sure. In terms of hours input / pay output ratio in AM, I'm not too sure, However, asset management tends to have a better work life balance than the investment banking side. Most of my clients in AM get in early, and leave around 5ish, which isn't bad time wise. You can easily make a decent living doing AM.

I have a friend who is about to start year 2 at HBS and got an offer at of fund of hedge funds that pays ~$275k starting, all in. She said she arrived around 7am and left between 5-6pm weekdays and never worked weekends when she interned there this past summer.

Hope this helps

I was talking to a guy who used to work at PIMCO, and he said most portfolio managers who've been there for at least a few years were making $500K+. But the real big money went to like the top 5 or so guys, who were easily making eight figures. And of course, gross and el-erian are making a lot more than that.

Any decent portfolio manager will be working hard and have an irregular lifestyle. They have to travel around doing research and meeting with clients, so it comes with the territory. I don't know why people on this board seem to get the impression that mutual fund companies are tame beasts compared to those wild hedge fund cowboys. Most of the time, they really aren't all that different.

Thanks for the responses. If anybody has any further information please post it.

Typically mutual fund managers have over 8 years experience, they tend to promote from within.
Long story short career path is Analyst >>> Portfolio Manager.
Pay for Portfolio Managers are based on their track record i.e. returns vs. benchmark, tracking error, AUMs, etc.

http://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forums/am-portfolio-manager-career-path#…

This guy put it better.

Thanks for the responses. I am, however, mostly looking for information about salary and lifestyle and am not yet ready to explore the career path in much depth.

Don't you want to consider becoming a trader rather than managing others account?

Hi Sellena,
Well what exactly does a trader do? Also what is the lifestyle (ie. hours worked) and salary of a trader like?

bump

the salary straight out of college up to business school is no different from our investment banking counterparts. lifestyle is a tad bit lenient in terms of work-life balance but dont count on it

How about life style/hours for west coast AM firms? Any truth to getting in at 4am leaving at 2pm or something close? Thanks.

I'm at an AM firm on the west coast- hours are 5:30 to around 4-4:30. sometimes 3:30. I think my firm's culture is very chill compared to what I've read about others though.

Asset Management Salary Progression (Originally Posted: 03/23/2013)

I was hoping someone might be able to elaborate on the typical salary progression for an asset management employee straight out of undergrad at a BB or traditional manager or both if its the same. For example:
Analyst: 1,000,000
2nd year analyst: 1.2 million
Associate, vp, etc..(with more realistic numbers of course)

Thanks in advance

P.s. I tried using the search function already, if you can find a good thread, touché please share the link

How much does post MBA Blackrock asset allocation make?

I'm a senior analyst at a large NYC AM firm. On a portfolio team that runs fairly concentrated (~35 names) w/ low turnover (~25%). 

Lifestyle - hours are VERY SEASONAL... it starts w/ earnings season, which is obviously 4x per year. There's a cycle to earnings. It starts w/ earnings prep/previews (are there any actions you want to take BEFORE earnings), then earnings itself (which is working around the clock, usually including at least one weekend day), then post-earnings catch-up (catching up on whatever you missed during earnings and prioritizing research after any surprises). 

Your life will revolve around the earnings cycle. Most of your work will be a lot of maintenance. Even though our turnover is low (~25%) there's usually a fair amount of maintenance work on names. You never want to be blindsided. In between earnings your time is mostly prospecting. The hours are a lot less than earnings season unless you're traveling. If you're traveling to conferences, there's a ton of meeting prep. There's no point in traveling to a conference and getting time with a CEO/CFO if you don't have a ton of very specific questions that only they can answer. Conferences and travel is very seasonal too. It's almost always outside of earnings, and the busiest periods are at the beginning of the year (when companies are giving guidance and faster-money players are positioning their book for the year) and after labor day (where companies often update guidance into year-end and fast-money is repositioning their portfolio to either protect gains or catch-up on returns before year-end). Volatility is biggest early year and end of year, consistent with that seasonality. Things slow down A LOT in the summer and it's the best time of year, so enjoy it. It used to be that December was a calm month too, but over the past ~5 years more and more companies have started doing investor day's and other activities in December because it was an open part of the calendar. Initially it was the first week of December, now the second week is pretty busy too. But the last two weeks are usually empty, which is great. Enjoy it while it lasts. Things rush back to a start in January.

Here's the thing on lifestyle... ultimately, it's up to you. Early on (like in any field on WSO) you should work around the clock in order to advance your skills and establish a lead on other analysts in your group. Over your first decade it's all about advancing your skills and gaining experience. After that first 7-10 years or so you'll have the skills/experience you need and then you have to master the mental game and manage yourself. Getting breaks is key to managing your energy levels and productivity. At this point in your career, managing yourself becomes very important. 

My lifestyle (before COVID WFH) - morning routine has been the same for 10-15 years... Up at 5am, very quick workout (20-25 min), catch train to city 6am, at desk 7:15-7:30. My evening routine has steadily evolved... when I was on the sell side I worked until 10pm+ M-Th. When I went to the buy-side I started leaving at 9pm and every 1-2 years it moved down about an hour from 9pm to 8pm to 7pm to 6pm. Now, to beat the rush, I leave 4:55pm, but work religiously on the train ride (>1 hour) and sometimes may need to dial-in from home afterwards. I try to only work weekends during earnings season. It's a real drain on productivity. You can't burn the candle from both ends forever. 

Compensation - is really hard to answer because #1 there's a lot of variability by type of firm (i.e. a top 50 asset manager vs. a regional RIA) and #2 it is coming down... AUM is moving to passive and fees are coming down, a double headwind for the industry. You can't take the back office pay down, so this is primarily coming out of the front office jobs. Today's PM's will likely never see the comp that outgoing PM's saw and the same is probably true for analysts. The divide is smaller at the more junior jobs, it's mostly the top end where things are changing. Everything is driven by AUM and fees... you can't change the math. My firm only hires experienced analysts. The initial range is probably $200-350k initially. I'd say senior analyst range is probably $400-800k, though as comp comes down there's a lot fewer seats at the $700-800k level (there used to be $1m+ analyst seats, but they're probably entirely gone now on the long only side). PM comp can be anything, it's just a function of AUM and fees. These pay ranges are probably only accurate for maybe top 100 sized AM firms... I'm guessing the pay may be lower for smaller firms w/ less AUM.