Hedge Fund Search Digest
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Hedge Fund Employment News Roundup
A few recent clippings from the press. And this article is worth a quick gander for some timely tips on career management.
UBS restructuring compensation. A “phantom equity” scheme would reward employees according to the performance of their unit within the firm. And the firm’s budget for employee compensation will shrink by one-third this year.
Investment banking jobs outsourced to India. “How much of Wall St.’s work force could be shipped overseas for pennies on the dollar?” A consultant in this blog report claims, “as much as 40%, mostly from the investment bank and trading divisions.”
Merrill Lynch freezes hiring through 2008. Here is The City reproduces an internal memo.
Hedge funds continue hiring. Citadel, SAC Capital and others, despite ongoing fund closures.
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Sep 9th, 2008
Quant Job in Chicago
Here’s a pretty typical post, in terms of both responsibilities and qualifications, for a hedge fund quant job that just came across our wire from a well-known hedge fund recruiter in New York City.
Quantitative Equities Analyst
Chicago, IL
Prestigious Chicago-based hedge fund specializing in long/short global equities strategies is seeking a quant analyst to join their Quantitative Portfolio Management team. Responsibilities include:
- Portfolio Construction
- Asset Allocation
- Strategy Development
- Testing and Risk Modeling
This position provides opportunities to do cutting-edge modeling and advance to a portfolio management role. Applicants should have:
1 Comment » Sep 5th, 2008
Hedge Fund Job Interview Question: Weighing the Odd Marble
This is a challenging, and quite popular, question of pure logic you could easily encounter as a hedge fund job interview question. We suggest you don’t skip right to the answer, but take some time to digest the problem if it stumps you. Also, remembering the principles of the solution may be easier than remembering the details. Good luck!
Question:
You are given a set of scales and 12 marbles. The scales are of the old balance variety. That is, a small dish hangs from each end of a rod that is balanced in the middle. The device enables you to conclude either that the contents of the dishes weigh the same or that the dish that falls lower has heavier contents than the other.
The 12 marbles appear to be identical. In fact, 11 of them are identical, and one is of a different weight. Your task is to identify the unusual marble and discard it. You are allowed to use the scales three times if you wish, but no more.
Note that the unusual marble may be heavier than the others, or it may be lighter. You are asked to both identify it and determine whether it is heavy or light.
Answer:
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3 Comments » Sep 3rd, 2008
Hedge Fund Launches to August 29
A slow time for hedge fund launches.
Citadel (Chicago) aims to launch a new global macro fund.
The Debt Market Opportunity Fund, investing in Australian mortgages, is run by Macquarie Funds Management.
The Global Opportunity Strategy Fund is from Advent Capital Management (London and New York).
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No Comments » Aug 29th, 2008
Hedge Fund Margin / Treasury Manager in New York City
Base salary for this position in New York City is $110k and anticipated bonus is in the $55k to $100k range. It offers a good entry into the hedge fund industry from a brokerage background, with the possibility of a strong career progression from there. Find this and other hedge fund jobs and hedge fund recruiters.
Margin / Treasury Manager
New York, NY
Top hedge fund / private equity firm seeks Margin / Treasury Manager. Looking for 3-10 years of relevant experience in the hedge fund, prime broker or broker / dealer space, with an understanding of valuation activity related to liquidity, leverage and the validation of margin calls. Ability to look at all TRS structures and identify the points that can trigger defaults and generate better rates on borrow / debit balances and collateral management through the prime broker.
Provides excellent exposure and growth opportunities leading to a management role, greater involvement with compliance, and possible move to the risk management side.
No Comments » Aug 28th, 2008
Positions On A Hedge Fund Team
The range of functional roles at a hedge fund is variable across the lifespan of that fund, and also variable for different funds in the industry. Just as a new fund must often start small in terms of assets under management, typically there are few people on the initial team as well, with every partner or employee wearing multiple hats. Some funds keep it that way for their entire life span; organization at a small fund tends to be informal.
One manager of a small fund remarked to us, “I give titles because people in the outside world need them. But titles create a certain hierarchy, and while there is always one person who makes the final decision, if you treat people like we’re all equal, people appreciate it and have a vested interest. Everybody knows they have a vested interest here; that’s why they’re loyal.”
No Comments » Aug 26th, 2008
Hedge Fund Base Pay & Bonus: 2007 vs. 2008
Hedge Fund Search Digest’s 2007 Hedge Fund Compensation Report concluded, “For hedge fund firms to attract and keep the best players, some changes need to take place. The study shows notable turnover in the smaller funds. It is well known that small funds don’t have the large management fees to support high compensation increases in years of low fund performance. The firms represented here are performing well overall and yet, they should still be concerned about turnover. It is time to take closer look at compensation packages and other employee retention methods.”
That was before the credit crunch. Since then, the industry has seen many small funds close, others launch in hopes of profiting from distressed markets, and a general trend toward consolidation in which assets have been increasingly directed toward large, well-established funds. Also, while employment at hedge funds has always been competitive (and of course still is), hiring in the industry has been brisk, with stable funds amassing human capital from among many desirable candidates, including whole teams, looking for work. One recruiter specializing in financial technology in the Northeast corridor says, “Everybody wants to go to a good hedge fund now. It’s easy to attract candidates. And hiring is good, there are definitely opportunities.” Tectonic shifts in the industry and the financial world as a whole make the price of talent a murky question this year.
No Comments » Aug 22nd, 2008
Senior Developer / Quant Hedge Fund Job in New York / Greenwich
This hedge fund job, for an immediate hire, is with a new fund with offices in Greenwich, CT and New York City. The post is a bit slim on detail (qualifications, responsibilities, trading strategies, technologies, &c) compared to other job descriptions for quant jobs. That probably means the firm is interested in talking to more, rather than fewer, candidates, and probably indicates an entrepreneurial environment where a wider, rather than narrower, skill set will be appreciated. The hiring firm’s focus on distressed investing represents a current trend in hedge fund launches.
Front Office Senior Developer / Quant
New York, NY / Greenwich, CT
New distressed asset-backed hedge fund seeks a strong programmer with experience analyzing asset-backed products such as mortgages and autos to work in a senior front office development role. Will be the lead developer of tools to help the portfolio managers trade the market. This role will provide great opportunities to learn the financial markets with tremendous growth potential in the front office.
1 Comment » Aug 20th, 2008
Hedge Fund Launches to August 15th
Intrepid managers, both veteran and green, continue to launch hedge funds despite uncertain market conditions and a challenging fund-raising environment. Here are hedge fund launches reported during the last two weeks.
Ansbacher Investment Management (New York) will launch a new strategy in equities this quarter.
James Pallotta will leave Tudor Investment Corp. to found his own firm next year.
The GAM Multi-Environmental (UK) is a clean-tech fund-of-funds.
Occam Asset Management (UK) will launch its Europe Focus and Asia Focus funds this Fall.
The Akamai Pan-Asia Fund is from Geomatrix (Hong Kong).
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1 Comment » Aug 19th, 2008
Hedge Fund Job Interview Question: The King’s Conundrum
It would be a royal pain not to know the answer to this puzzler in a job interview!
Question:
This is an absolute classic. A king demands a tax of 1,000 gold sovereigns from each of 10 regions of his nation. The tax collectors for each region bring him the requested bag of gold coins at year end. An informant tells the king that one tax collector is cheating and giving coins that are consistently 10% lighter than they should be, but he does not know which collector is cheating. The king knows that each coin should weigh exactly one ounce. How can the king identify the cheat by using a weighing device exactly once?
Answer:
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2 Comments » Aug 15th, 2008