Does anyone have experience with US Trust - BOA Portfolio Manager Associate role?
Hey guys,
What's your opinion on the role below for someone trying to break into AM? It's an entry level position but sounds more like a pure PWM role. Can this be useful for future career prospects combined with a CFA?
U.S. Trust is part of the Global Wealth and Investment Management unit of Bank of America, N.A., which is a global leader in wealth management, private banking and retail brokerage. U.S. Trust employs more than 4,100 professionals and maintains 135 offices in 33 states.
Job Description
The Portfolio Manager Associate is charged with assisting a team of Portfolio Managers in providing integrated investment advice and portfolio management services to high net worth clients. A team player with excellent communication skills, computer proficiency and high level of professionalism. Must have an undergraduate degree in Finance, Accounting, Economics or equivalent.
Create asset allocation studies utilizing data collected in the client profiling process; verify/test assumptions and constraints; confirm findings through iterative ratification process with the PM.
Ensure knowledge of entire investment solution suite; recommend investment solutions to PM for client use based upon clients' needs and constraints.
Monitor/facilitate account set up resulting in error free account set up process; ensure timely account set up and investment of funds.
Re-balance portfolio due to liquidity needs, bond maturities, excess cash, buy/sell implementation, tax loss harvesting, investment recommendation implementation - deployment of cash liquidation of positions.
Handle trade order entry for portfolio transactions, and administration of custody account trades and performance.
Reg. 9 meeting preparation, review exceptions and recommend strategy to resolve exceptions.
Prepare meeting materials; generate research materials - proprietary, economic commentary and Bloomberg etc. as needed for client and prospect meetings.
Respond to client requests when PMs are out of office.
Team with Portfolio Management Assistant(s) to ensure consistent support for the PM team.
bump also interested
UST has 5 core roles: private client advisor (sales), private client manager (relationship/banking), trust officer (trust/account admin, opening), wealth strategist (estate planning), portfolio manager (investments). This role is on the investment side where there is normally a PM assistant, PM associate and some combination of a PMI, PMII, PMIII (#'s relate to AUM generally).
UST really depends on office but you are relatively limited upside wise on pay. Pay is base and discretionary bonus. From this role you'd move to a PM1/PM2/PM3 role where accounts get larger as you go up each PM rank. I've seen people who are PM3's at 30 years old due to turnover and make maybe $180k but PM pay is capped at probably $400k even if you have a $1.5b+ book. PCAs will get the bulk of pay for better or worse. You'll be helping PMs with portfolio management and some compliance/risk management stuff. It's not a bad gig though in my opinion and UST is big on the CFA, except they recently changed their policy where you have to pay for materials/exam if you fail.
Turnover where I was was insanely high and I think firm wise it is too. Pay is below average for what you do in my opinion as well and the investments are relatively rigid but not as bad as JPM and other private banks.
PM Assistant is the entry level role (it’s a demeaning title). Associates normally have 1-3 years experience depending where you come from. You usually take on a hands-on approach to helping the portfolio managers in comparison to the assistants; although they do encourage assistants to be just as involved too. You should be able to:
Additionally, you will be expected to support assistants in generating any supporting compliance documents, addressing REG 9 comments, creating presentations, etc.
In the private bank, you’re very much involved in client management as an FYI. As the previous comment said, they tend to favor people who pursue CFA. Do not pursue this if you are not interested in becoming a client facing PM in the long run, as that’s what management usually pushes you to do. Client facing roles aren’t exciting and HNW are extremely demanding.
However, If this is something you’re interested in, then it’s a pretty dope role bc BofA private bank has a pretty inclusive and well connected culture in comparison to other private banks. Hours are great too. Usually 9-6 (even in busy offices). Pay isn’t as great though.
When you highlight that pay isn't as great, do you know what to expect going from Analyst to Associate/PM1,2,3?
Also, any insight as to why they underpay vs. market given its a buyside role?
Not how you are defining buyside? But compensation for PM Assistant is 55k - 75k (depending what city you are working in). I have friends in JPM Private Bank who earn 85k straight out of college (as a point of reference). Not sure what the pay is for associate but I can't imagine it being more than 90k (even in NYC)
I would pursue this role if you:
Want to learn how to manage portfolios on behalf of clients and learn how to interact with wealthy individuals
Actually enjoy learning about investment opportunities (although our suite of investment options is pretty limited in comparison to a brokerage due to the fiduciary standard).
Want a good intro to finance if you're coming out of college
I am not sure why compensation is below market average but if I had to take a lucky guess it would be that portfolio managers at the private bank are not required to partake in prospecting like an advisor from Merrill would... the private client advisors (sales people) are the ones who earn the most.
bump - anyone have an answer to this?
Bump - Anyone have more details on pay scale for this role?
Anyone??
Also interested, interviewing now and would love to get a true sense of compensation expectations.
Bump - interview process halted due to COVID so I wanted to reach out again if anyone had any insight.
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