London Hedge Fund Recruiting
Background: I have an offer for FT IBD in London (think Citi, DB, Barclays etc.), looking to move into a L/S equity fund in the long run. A few questions if someone would be kind enough to help:
How does HF recruiting work in London? Does firm prestige matter much at this level? Would I be better off at an elite boutique, say?
Any other advice would be much appreciated.
Interested in this as well
So you're asking if you should decline the offer from a Barclays/Citi/DB, an internationally known enterprise, and seek out an elite boutique? That will not help your chances of breaking into the London HF scene.
London's HF environment isn't really much different than that of New York's. Many of the large shops have offices in both cities, and they are operate in a similar fashion. I'm not much help when it comes to recruiting, but I do know that many HFs in London also use head hunters, much like they do here.
prestige always matter, slightly less than in the US.
elite boutiques name recognition in london is a lot weaker than in the US, I would stick to the BBs (unless you define roth/laz as elite boutiques, they are very well recognized obv.).
people generally tend to stay longer in banking (us hf recruiting tends to be after 1-2 years, london is more after 2-4)
Thanks to you both for your replies.
My gut instinct is that the BB name would be better known. But my fear is that it might be easier to be spotted by headhunters at a boutique. I guess my underlying question is: how hard is it to get noticed by headhunters working at a BB, when there are >100 guys/firm as their potential market?
On a more general level, when is it appropriate to contact recruiters? I'm keen to separate myself from the bunch as early as possible but obviously I don't want to be an idiot about it.
hh need to spot you out of the entire talent pool, not out of your firm. I wouldnt worry about the competition too much, most bankers have zero idea about the markets or wtf is going on in general.
HH depends on how well you fit the profile of what funds are looking for, most jobs are posted on efinancial careers. If you match the profile hh will find you (just make sure your linkedin is up to date), if not just call them yourself. In either case just have a good story prepared as to why you want to work at a hf and be clear that you only want to work at a hf and are not interested in pe whatsoever.
Thanks again for the info leveredarb.
Is this job board on efinancialcareers really that complete? There are only a few names of recruiters/firms that ever come up on there, at least whenever I look at it, and I've never seen the name of any of the recruiters which are supposedly used for top funds. Am I missing something?
fairly complete yes, obv. will not cover the entire universe, Ive seen postings from almost all hhs on there, what top ones do you think are missing?
Job boards are a lot like real estate listings in large cities, they're not always up to date and they are sometimes just a representation of what is out there.
If you know of some top HF recruiters, just reach out to them directly. Get yourself on their radar so that your name will pop up when they have a role that interests you and fits your profile.
BTW, as leveredarb asked, what recruiters do you think are well respected but are missing? I'm curious for my own benefit ;-)
yeah just to clarify, I wouldnt rly on efinancial for a complete list of jobs, its more to get an idea of the profile that they are looking for and to get all the names of the hhs that list there.
From my discussions with recruiters in London, there is a preference to place candidates out of BB rather than elite boutiques (I was extremely surprised, so if any fellow monkeys know otherwise, please comment).
Also, from looking on efinancial, plenty of L/S equity funds looking for analysts, but they want analysts who already have prior experience in the L/S space. Are there really so few first-time hedge fund roles for analysts coming out of IBD?
Not sure why you're relying on eFinancial for your information. You should really do yourself the service of reaching out to 2 or 3 respected recruiters in the HF space in London and give them a synopsis of your background and where you want to work. They will give you a better idea of what's out there, what their clients look for, etc.
At an entry-level (i.e. Junior Analyst role), they will most certainly be considering guys who have worked in IBD and ER on the sell-side at reputable firms.
Going 2-3 yrs IBD to L/S Equity fund is much more difficult in London than in the States (currently anyway). There are buyside opportunities in PE and Distressed debt hedge funds though.
In london, it is much more difficult to jump to hedge fund post 1 or 2 years in IBD...
usually you need some buyside experience before you can jump to a good name HF....or i have seen people with longer ibd experience but FOLLOW the market closely throughout their IBD career make it to the HF
Not sure about equities, but I know DB placed a few good distressed debt spots lately (junior, 2 yr pre-mba programs) in London.
I've heard from more than 1 headhunter in London too that because of how business works in Europe vs US, it takes longer to develop equivalent skills in Europe - partly a function of deal flow, how diverse things are, how mandates work etc. - so to develop a similar level of specialty/seasoning that takes 3-4 years in the UK might only take 2-3 years in the US. Just hypothesis tho.
Of course you do have an enormous edge if you have been focusing on a specific sector/geography that a hedge fund is looking to cover and especially if you speak a Euro language.
Curious are you an EU citizen?
Definitely lean on recruiters for actual opportunities, but I still find it useful to look on efinancial to get a general feel for what's going on in terms of hiring.
Agree that there are a lot more opportunities in PE and distressed debt right now in London, esp. distressed debt. Is hiring in L/S HFs just dead at the moment, or has it always been that difficult to break into in London?
Frgna, unfortunately, not an EU citizen, so recruiting is a pain sometimes.
Also, does anyone have thoughts on breaking into London PE / HF from BB vs. boutiques (using "boutique" a little loosely, but referring to Lazard / Greenhill / Rothschild / Moelis / Evercore )
l/s hf hiring is pretty quiet right now in london, some opportunities still exist but debt is where its at currently
boutiques restructuring teams place phenomenally well into distressed
How long do you thing distressed debt will be the focus? Obviously the macro environment will determine much of this, but what do we think?
Also, the word profile has be thrown around quite a lot. Beyond working in BB M&A (or whatever the specific focus is) and having top academic creds, what does that profile consist of?
on top of the factors you mentioned, languages are key.
we will see how distressed plays out, ltro delayed some restructuring but we are only a few years into the lost decade so it will be around some more.
Im personally a bit wary of distressed as so much money and talent has piled into it that once the asset class becomes less attractive there will be a lot of guys out of work, and going from credit to equity is tough
Just a casual observation, but it seems like there are way more event driven or l/s equity postings on efinancialcareers for the London market rather than NYC. As someone that knows absolutely nothing about the market for financial services professionals in Europe, can somebody offer some color here? I'm under the impression that a lot of NYC funds don't post on efinancial and rely on headhunters instead.
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