Small RIA (8-12 employees) with a wide variety of strategies from traditional stock & bond to managed futures and alternatives. ~$1B AUM. Thoughts? Pay? Interview is next week. ---- Investment Analyst Job Description: The goal of this position is to assist in providing the highest level of investment planning to the clients of firm. Primary Responsibilities: * Assist in the coordination of all due diligence, both quantitative and qualitative. * Coordinate and conduct manager calls * Assist with all other investment related research. * Continually review and enhance due diligence processes. * Compile and monitor allocations models. * Perform and oversee the due diligence process for new potential investments for client use. * Conducting searches for possible investments to be used in specific traditional and alternative asset classes. * Compile market and presentation materials for quarterly webinar. * Assist in preparation of Investment Policy Statements. * Prepare due diligence and investment reports for review and discussion of mutual fund/money manager recommendations in advance of monthly conference calls. * Assist in preparation of monthly due diligence conference calls. * Monitor current market and economic information and apply it to the due diligence process. This includes identifying current investment trends, new products, and developing capital market expectations. * Assist in preparation of quarterly cover letters for inclusion in performance reports. * Assist in client meeting preparation, including compiling portfolio analysis, agendas, etc. * Provide daily assistance to management and other team members. * No client interaction and no responsibilities to manage client relationships. Qualifications: * Bachelor’s degree is required, preferably in accounting, finance, economics or related field. * Two to three years of relevant investment research experience required, preferably research involving mutual funds. * Entrepreneurial spirit and interested in helping to contribute to growth of company. * Ability to multi-task and thrive in an environment that encourages change and continued improvement. * Strong attention to detail skills. * Polished written communication skills. * Team-oriented nature to work in an integrated investment research role. * Strong knowledge of the various software and technical tools available, including Morningstar, MS Word, Outlook, PowerPoint and Excel. Experience with Junxure, PSN and Morningstar Direct a plus. * Professional designations: Either CFA (Chartered Financial Analysts) designation or CFP (Certified Financial Planner) designation preferred, but not required. However, attainment of one of these two designations expected within reasonable time after being hired.
The fact that they ask for CFA or CFP is probably a bad sign depending on your goals. Any hardcore CFA job you might want would have nothing to do with the CFP material. A key question, depending on your interests, might be the mix of time the job requires between due diligence and managing client needs (or at least the preperation of stuff they need since you apparently won’t be meeting with them). There is also an ambiguous administrative aspect to this in terms of “providing dailty assistance to management” which doesn’t sound like a positive. I am skeptical of this job.
Perhaps, but in a small RIA, you have to wear many hats sometimes. For example, I’m mostly about research, but I am spending most of today on improving compliance systems. A willingness to say “I know I was trained for X, but if we can’t get Y done with the staff we have, we’re not going to be able to do business, and therefore I’m willing to do it,” is important in a small entrepreneurial organization.
I definitely agree with bchad, however, I think some companies stretch this and are really looking for a glorified administrative assistant – the title “Investment Analyst” is very open-ended. Words like “Assist” with due diligence instead of “Conduct” due diligence seem like a red flag to me, although it does say “perform” a few bullets down. I would just clarify during the initial interview and make sure the expectations are on par with your own expectations. If the job is mostly about research, it could be quite good (although one wonders what kind of research – seems like you might be picking mutual funds).
I felt the same Bro. That said, I like the way this outfit conducts itself. I’m not opposed to RIAs, but I am coming out of a MBA program, and a big factor will be salary since I have some loans to pay back. I’ll follow up after the interview next week. I applied with the department manager of this position, but got a call from the president whom said he’d like to talk over lunch. If they are looking to grow the alternative space of this position as mentioned on the phone, I would be happy to join the team. My location is known for a ton of small outfits so I don’t feel that the size factor is a big issue. CFA vs. CFP. The firm has both. Advisors work with clients and financial planning and analysts to do the mf fund due dilly. They also have a tax department with 2 CPAs.
Yeah, just to clarify my post – I was aware you were coming out of an MBA program with some prior experience and my comment is tailored toward that. This would likely be a good job for a fresh BBA, but your situation is different. I can’t remember if you are a charterholder or not, but with an MBA you could easily be overqualified for such a role (or not, we’ll see). I agree 100% that there is nothing wrong with RIAs – maybe of them are great places to work and pay well. In some ways, a good RIA gig might be the golden ticket as you get good pay, get to schmooze with wealthy clients, and possibly don’t have to work that hard (at least relative to investment banking or hedge funds, etc.). That may or may not be this role, but certainly RIAs have a lot of potential in some cases.
I really appreciate your insight bro. I see a Masters in Tax in the firm profile page, but no MBAs. I do wonder about being overqualified, but asset management is a niche I have enoyed in the past so I would like to explore the opportunity. I’ll touch base next week after the interview.
I work at an RIA w/ $1.3B… my guess is that you’re over qualified and that they’ll ask you to wear many hats. You’ll probably be underwhelmed with the talent/knowledge there. Was it you that was flown (is that a real word?) out for 2 days of interviews in NYC? I thought they really liked you, did that fall through? Anyways, the work shouldn’t be nearly as grueling compared to working 11 hour days at a major bank. If work life balance is big to you, then it may not be a bad fit. If you do have your charter and/or your MBA is top 40 your definitely over qualified. I’d be surprised if they offered you more than $60k and I wouldn’t expect bonuses. Often these places need a lot of help operationally too.
I agree with what people have said. It does not sound like the type of job you’d want to go into post MBA unless you went to a low tier school and don’t have loans to pay back and you don’t want high compensation. You won’t get paid anything, because the qualifications they want aren’t that high, the value added of your work will be nebulous, no growth ops, and they won’t want to share any profits for a worker they will see as largely replaceable. No pay, no prospects. Pass on it. Also their website is crap.
I was flown out to NC for a rotational corporate finance post MBA program. Close but no cigar.
you are still the man in my book QuantJock
So I did some digging and found the AUM. This is from 2005 so it may be outdated, but they are quite low on assets. What is a typical profit margin for a RIA? The available funds to pay as salary looks rather small. No harm in interviewing, so we’ll see. But it appears the writing is on the wall. Appreciate the help. Assets Under Management YES F. (1) Do you provide continuous and regular supervisory or management services to securities portfolios? (2) If yes, what is the amount of your assets under management and total number of accounts? U.S. Dollar Amount Total Number of Accounts Discretionary: (a) 192,149,709.00 (d) 432 Non-Discretionary: (b) 39,22,940.00 (e) 8 Total: © $ 196,072,649.00 (f) 440
What is your long-term career goal, QJ?
out of all the jobhutners on this forum, quantjock will get a good one
I’ll lay my cards out tonight or tomorrow. Im studying for a financial risk management final exam now. Semester 3 of B School is done. My long term goal is blurred, guidance and feedback would be helpful.
blurred?
So you don’t have your MBA yet? I’ll assume no CFA either. Are you in the midwest too? You may want to take the position for a year or 2, at least to get some experiance, especially if other oppertunities aren’t presenting themselves. RIAs typically charge about 1%, so on $200m in AUM they prolly make $2 million/year in fees… definietly not much money to go around after the advisors take 30-40% of the fee. Take the interview… just ask yourself if you want to work there. If you already have better work experiance, its prolly wont due you much good other than the paycheck.
Thanks for the feedback everyone. My long term goals are a bit blurred. I wish to remain within the capital market space in some capacity, but my preferred job is still to be determined. I enjoy a bit of everything. My financial risk management class really opened my eyes to the analytics available to managing and monitoring risk. I am in a portfolio management class where I help manage $2.5M by doing bottom up stock research in the technology space. I enjoy the equity research and portfolio analytics this class focuses on. My background: Live in Midwest BS Finance - 3.4 GPA, crappy state school CFA Level 2 Candidate CAIA Charterholder MBA Finance/Accounting - 3.4 GPA, around top 40 rank Completed Series 7/66 Work Portfolio administration, small RIA - 2 years Personal tax preparation, Franchise and small independent practice - 2 seasons Buyside equity research support, small RIA - 6 months Other - bank customer service and bank product management internship - 1.5 years I just turned 27. I’ve been considered positions that deal in valuation, corporate finance, and the majority of financial service industry positions. I would like to remain in the financial service industry, however I’m considering treasury/corporate development type of positions since they carry similiar traits. Overall I’m not too particular, my career interests are wide, and I can adapt to a variety of environments. I have been told I have no direction and that I need to obtain some focus. Frankly I’m still not sure what I should be after my MBA.
I’m going to send you an email tomorrow qj if I get sometime, otherwise sometime this weekend. I think I can give you some good info/leads.
The thing is my goal is a blank slate. If a job looks dynamic and compelling at a decent outfit, I apply. I could easily see myself being successful within a variety of positions from IB to corporate finance. Lately I’ve been securing interviews to positions in both capacities. I realize this random walk can be viewed negatively (wtf, you mean you didn’t know you wanted to do M&A since you were 7?), but I see it as now is the time to stick to my core specialties and explore a variety of post MBA careers.