Need guidance for a career in FP&A

I’m a BBA - Finance grad looking to work in FP&A. I have six months of work experience in an investment banking KPO. What further qualifications should I look to get under my belt?

Why IB to FP&A?

Why FP&A period?

CFO path possibly? If the company is big enough, you can make more than bankers easy. Although, your chances of becoming CFO at a Fortune1000 level company probably aren’t too good : /

Never seen someone who wants to move from IB to FP&A…

^look up what KPO does

CFO at med sized hedge fund…AUM of around 500mm makes around 800k a year all in. Senior Analysts/PMs make about the same money… Yes, the analysts are about 10 years younger than the CFO but 800k is 800k. Controllers at said firms make about 200k all in. Junior analysts make around 250k all in. Director of Finance makes around 300k. These are numbers I have personally seen and heard from fellow friends in the field.

Doubtful? if you are personal friends with a recruiters, ask for their internal annual data of salaries. Salaries they themselves placed according to fund size and position whether front or back. Their numbers will not be far off from mine.

Benefits of operations is that because you are in the back of the line, you are not the first to get hacked in the throat at a fund. At a bank, operations are first to go but not at funds - the front office is out then replaced when the time is right.

I assume you’d need to have good understanding of financial statements and GAAP stuff. Still need to do pro forma statements just like in IB and cash flow estimation and exptected IRR.

That’s at a fund though. The CFO at my prior firm made $2.6 million last year total comp. They had ~$5B in revenues. Probably not too impossible to attain but I mean if you think about it, between that and Wal Mart with annual revenues of almost 100 times that, the amount of firms is in the thousands. However, represents what is likely to be a single digit percentage of all of your options to get an FP&A job somewhere.

Glocap puts out a salary guide every year for Hedge Funds at each position. I’ve seen it and your numbers are basically the same so I believe you for sure.

Fine, but I don’t think we can really plan for being a CFO when looking for entry level jobs in FPA… That’s like top 0.2% or whatever of people. If you are top 10% in IB, you are definitely making seven figures. Run of the mill front office people have a good chance of seeing that number you mentioned, in fact. So you are usually just better off with the better entry level job, if money is the only consideration.

Furthermore, there seems to be the assumption here that FPA is the best path to becoming a CFO. This might not be the case. CFO at my firm is an IB sort of type in fact. Compensation is easily in 9 figures given we are in a large company.

So you are controlling for the fact that IB is harder to get into, therefore he might as well stay. That’s a good point but maybe he doesn’t care about the money haha just thought of that. Only took commenting on it back and forth a few times

money wise if you are in the top 10% in your field you will make good money. director of finance or ops at a fund will net you between 300-450k. Of course top analysts after slaving away 100 hours a week and from a top school could be making 7 figures. But for most 400k a year is still very good and puts you at top 0.5% in the US. I don’t know about you but being in the top 1% in your own city at anything is a very tough task…forget the city just your neighborhood…

That’s definitely in NYC though. I do only know personally maybe a handful of people that make 400k or higher so that’s true but trust me when I say that in FL, you don’t make that at probably the associate level even. 1st year analyst like 125-140K and few years experience right under 200k and that’s pushin it. Management thinks, oh you have a weather premium to consider and COL, no state income tax, etc. :slight_smile:

this is hilarious. The poor guy just wants an entry level job and you jabronis are quoting out these numbers that you can only sniff in your dreams. Also, these numbers are very unrealistic unless we are talking NYC only here. Most finance(excluding front-office jobs) big dogs are capped at $400k in all other major cities

nooo but this is the AF…duh AF forum mang…90% of us are market movers with each key stroke…

jokes aside…91% of AF members make 7 figures. we have the CFA the best there is. Harvard or CFA!

9% make +8 figures.

also very false on " Most finance(excluding front-office jobs) big dogs are capped at $400k in all other major cities "

This conversation has gone down a strange path. The guy is at an IB KPO (Knowledge Process Outsourcing). He’s probably one of those back office IT process support guys in India attached to an IB. Not really sure where the CFO talk is coming from…

the dude wants to go into FP&A…so some suggested this route is to the CFO route IF he makes it to the top. another AF member said nah why you want to go FP&A?? so i wrote that actually money is good for ops people at hedge funds and also safer than front office. yes, the thread just like most threads got sidetracked with some sprinkle of sarcasm but still passable.

you can add fantasy in there.

these threads are starting to get blurry - I’m just here for the drama and trolling at this point. Really praying we get another pharma grad who expects to make 1.5m in 3years time as an ER associate soon.

not sure which part of my posts are fantasy…except of course my reply to Stallion…

Yeah there is nothing fantasy about the figures you quoted for a 500MM AUM fund in the city. What I realllllly want to know though is what my old boss makes after leaving his post as a Director of Research to start a Hedge Fund between 200-300MM in AUM. Couple million a year?