Is Anton Kreil's HF salary and trajectory data BS?

In his 5 part video series Anton Kreil seems to do a pretty convincing take-down of IB as a long term career, arguing for HF as a better track.

Part 1:

He then pivots into what seems to me to be BS territory. I haven't worked for a HF so thought I'd just come check my intuition here.

He makes the case that by working at a top HF (which he loosely defines as >$1B) you should be able to save about $5.7M by 32 (breakdown in video 4, around the 7min mark). However this number is based on several assumptions I find faulty:

  1. His model assumes comp of $160K for years 1-2 and $700K ($300K base, $400K bonus) thereafter. This salary (as well its ramp-up time) doesn't agree with WSO's salary surveys (unless you're cherry picking a handful of data-points from the VP/MD level). That said, the WSO survey doesn't include much data at these high levels so it might be off. So I wanted to ask the community, do either the comp, or timelines agree with your experience?
  2. As mentioned above, the assumption is that you're working for a HF with at least $1B AUM. He's comparing the typical IB salary to the high end of the HF salary.
  3. His model assumes that you get a job at a HF straight out of undergrad and keep working there without leaving. Don't many HFs recruit out of banking programs, if so that would add 2 years. Also, are MBAs common for advancement in the HF world? If so that would add another 2 years. I might be off on this last bullet - I'm in PE where these are more realistic working assumptions but this just might not be the case for HFs.

Anton is retired and makes money selling education for traders - so he may have an incentive to present HFs (and implicitly, the education which might help you land a job there) in a better light - but this seemed way way off.

Thoughts?

 
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mangoeldar:
In his 5 part video series Anton Kreil seems to do a pretty convincing take-down of IB as a long term career, arguing for HF as a better track.

Part 1:

He then pivots into what seems to me to be BS territory. I haven't worked for a HF so thought I'd just come check my intuition here.

He makes the case that by working at a top HF (which he loosely defines as >$1B) you should be able to save about $5.7M by 32 (breakdown in video 4, around the 7min mark). However this number is based on several assumptions I find faulty:

  1. His model assumes comp of $160K for years 1-2 and $700K ($300K base, $400K bonus) thereafter. This salary (as well its ramp-up time) doesn't agree with WSO's salary surveys (unless you're cherry picking a handful of data-points from the VP/MD level). That said, the WSO survey doesn't include much data at these high levels so it might be off. So I wanted to ask the community, do either the comp, or timelines agree with your experience?
  2. As mentioned above, the assumption is that you're working for a HF with at least $1B AUM. He's comparing the typical IB salary to the high end of the HF salary.
  3. His model assumes that you get a job at a HF straight out of undergrad and keep working there without leaving. Don't many HFs recruit out of banking programs, if so that would add 2 years. Also, are MBAs common for advancement in the HF world? If so that would add another 2 years. I might be off on this last bullet - I'm in PE where these are more realistic working assumptions but this just might not be the case for HFs.

Anton is retired and makes money selling education for traders - so he may have an incentive to present HFs (and implicitly, the education which might help you land a job there) in a better light - but this seemed way way off.

Thoughts?

What is the point of this? Either his video or this thread.

Buy-side and sell-side are fundamentally different jobs. We might as well debate "doctor vs. lawyer" or "chef vs. sommelier".

This is so stupid that it doesn't warrant any discussion. I'm ashamed I've spent the last 45 seconds typing this post

 
Most Helpful
mangoeldar:
In his 5 part video series Anton Kreil seems to do a pretty convincing take-down of IB as a long term career, arguing for HF as a better track.

Part 1:

He then pivots into what seems to me to be BS territory. I haven't worked for a HF so thought I'd just come check my intuition here.

He makes the case that by working at a top HF (which he loosely defines as >$1B) you should be able to save about $5.7M by 32 (breakdown in video 4, around the 7min mark). However this number is based on several assumptions I find faulty:

  1. His model assumes comp of $160K for years 1-2 and $700K ($300K base, $400K bonus) thereafter. This salary (as well its ramp-up time) doesn't agree with WSO's salary surveys (unless you're cherry picking a handful of data-points from the VP/MD level). That said, the WSO survey doesn't include much data at these high levels so it might be off. So I wanted to ask the community, do either the comp, or timelines agree with your experience?
  2. As mentioned above, the assumption is that you're working for a HF with at least $1B AUM. He's comparing the typical IB salary to the high end of the HF salary.
  3. His model assumes that you get a job at a HF straight out of undergrad and keep working there without leaving. Don't many HFs recruit out of banking programs, if so that would add 2 years. Also, are MBAs common for advancement in the HF world? If so that would add another 2 years. I might be off on this last bullet - I'm in PE where these are more realistic working assumptions but this just might not be the case for HFs.

Anton is retired and makes money selling education for traders - so he may have an incentive to present HFs (and implicitly, the education which might help you land a job there) in a better light - but this seemed way way off.

Thoughts?

Also, who the fuck is this guy anyways? I looked at his LinkedIn and he was a trader for a grand total of 6 or 7 years. I don't know many good "retired" traders who went into the business of hawking snake oil as opposed to taking a lucrative job at a hedge fund (if they like it) or just getting the fuck away from finance entirely (if they hate it). Maybe he made a shitload of money in those 6 or 7 years. Good for him. But I'd find it odd that someone would be that good and make so much money and quit only to stay on the edges of the industry. I'd think if you were that good and quit it was because you wanted to something completely different, not teach people how to do what you hated.

"Head of Pan European Pharmaceuticals and Chemicals Trading". Sounds fancy, but anyone who's been within 5 feet of a trading desk knows that means he was probably the only guy at the bank trading European pharmaceuticals and chemicals, and made the title up himself. Maaaaaybe he had a junior. It's not like banking where you have 20 analysts and 4 MDs for a sector, on the desk there might be 20 people each with their own very specific focus. So yeah, I guess they're all "heads" of whatever they trade. Head Coca-cola trader, head AT&T trader, whatever...

He probably got canned in 2007-2008, wanted to stay in trading, couldn't find a job and realized he could do pretty well selling the dream to others.

 
mrb87:
What is the point of this? Either his video or this thread.

Dude, if you didn't like this thread you were welcome not to comment. Comments like this just discourage new people from asking questions.

mrb87:
Buy-side and sell-side are fundamentally different jobs. We might as well debate "doctor vs. lawyer" or "chef vs. sommelier".

First of all, this post has almost nothing to do with IB. I mention IB briefly to introduce the video I'm taking issue with, and again to ask if its a requirement for HF. My questions are to do with HF.

But more importantly, Lot's of people on here are comparing between buy side and sell side trajectories, or even just asking questions about completely different career paths out of curiosity - have you seriously never seen someone ask a question like Consulting vs IB on here? For the same reason, most career forums will have 'Doctor vs Lawyer' threads. I work neither in IB nor HF and this was just something I was wondering about. WSO should be a place where people can have these discussions, even if they are not interesting to you. I don't think we need scope police.

mrb87:
This is so stupid that it doesn't warrant any discussion. I'm ashamed I've spent the last 45 seconds typing this post.

Your first comment aside, I'm glad you took the time to rage-tweet your 3 post essay (capped with an all caps ad hominem - nice touch!), I had a feeling this guy was BS and you bring up some good points to back that up.

At any rate, you haven't actually answered my question, so if anyone else has something to say about his assumptions I'm still keen to have this discussion.

 
mangoeldar:
mrb87:
What is the point of this? Either his video or this thread.

Dude, if you didn't like this thread you were welcome not to comment. Comments like this just discourage new people from asking questions.

mrb87:
Buy-side and sell-side are fundamentally different jobs. We might as well debate "doctor vs. lawyer" or "chef vs. sommelier".

First of all, this post has almost nothing to do with IB. I mention IB briefly to introduce the video I'm taking issue with, and again to ask if its a requirement for HF. My questions are to do with HF.

But more importantly, Lot's of people on here are comparing between buy side and sell side trajectories, or even just asking questions about completely different career paths out of curiosity - have you seriously never seen someone ask a question like Consulting vs IB on here? For the same reason, most career forums will have 'Doctor vs Lawyer' threads. I work neither in IB nor HF and this was just something I was wondering about. WSO should be a place where people can have these discussions, even if they are not interesting to you. I don't think we need scope police.

mrb87:
This is so stupid that it doesn't warrant any discussion. I'm ashamed I've spent the last 45 seconds typing this post.

Your first comment aside, I'm glad you took the time to rage-tweet your 3 post essay (capped with an all caps ad hominem - nice touch!), I had a feeling this guy was BS and you bring up some good points to back that up.

At any rate, you haven't actually answered my question, so if anyone else has something to say about his assumptions I'm still keen to have this discussion.

I’m sorry you took my insults of Anton Kreil so personally.

But if you can’t tell from my comments that you should take everything this guy says with a pound of salt...

 

Of it’s not bs. Many of people do that. Many guys got $10 million bonus year 4. Is it common. No, but it does happen.

Also this guy is a fraud. As below no successful trader sells trading products. Their off retired or if bored starting a small business. Or just working the market trying to make billions.

 

I'll keep it simple: With Anton,I've never been sure if he is actually a great trader/ finance personality. The main reason for that is that it seems he spends more telling selling (starting from his time on that tv show) than actually doing. Of course, we see some top HF guys love the limelight but they still spend most of their time investing/trading. This guy makes videos, runs courses all year round, and trolls people on Linkedin. Makes me wonder why you'd waste so much time and not focus on trading or managing money if you are actually good.

- Dr.Mikey Boi
 

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