The $405k hedge fund jobs going to ‘career changers.’ Deutsche’s layoffs start slowly

Hedge funds are having trouble finding good staff. So suggested the Financial Times last week, when it argued that hedge funds are having to grow their own now that investment banks don’t provide them with a steady flow of proprietary traders. Growing your own is expensive though. Some hedge funds seem to be hiring MBAs instead.

The latest employment report for the Stanford University Graduate School of Business, reported on the website Poets and Quants, says hedge funds have become the highest payers for Stanford MBAs. Median total compensation for new Stanford MBA graduates in the hedge fund industry is $370k (£240k), including $150k of salary and $220k of bonus. Their mean compensation is an even greater $405k (£266k).

Unfortunately, there’s no indication whether these highly rewarded MBAs had prior hedge fund experience, but history suggests that some did not have. Stanford’s MBA course includes a hedge fund module and the school has helped people break into hedge funds in the past. – Katya Taousse, director at London-based Pacific Asset Management Company, may work in a hedge fund now, but she was a senior analyst in a power company before she spent two years studying in California.

Separately, Deutsche Bank is due to make some redundancies. The bank is cutting thousands of people over the next few years, but for the moment it’s starting slowly. Bloomberg reports that four  people from the securitized debt group in New York have been deprived of their jobs.

Credit Suisse Cutting In New York (Reuters) 

Credit Suisse is not restricted its global macro redundancies to London. They’re happening in New York too.

Barclays Trader Scandal (Financial Times)

Barclays’ traders took advantage of clients: “Do not discuss last look with sales. If there has been a spurt [in rejected trades] just blame it on the weekend IT release and say it’s being fixed.”

Buy-side squeeze (Greenwich Research) 

Asset management pay is now falling.

From Credit Suisse to Wells Fargo (Bloomberg)

Wells Fargo has got a special arrangement that allows it to hire the unwanted Credit Suisse bankers in the US.

UBS hires Goldman e-Trading MD  (Bloomberg)

UBS just hired a Goldman Sachs MD as head of electronic trading in the Americas. He won’t actually start until February.

Morgan Stanley's New Head of M&A (NY Times) 

Morgan Stanley just appointed a woman as head of M&A in the Americas.

Bad Management (Bloomberg) 

How it is when you’re fired from Citi for doing things your managers told you to do: “I am sorry to see your career end this way.”

Global Macro Meltdown (FinAlternatives)

Don’t even think about joining a global macro fund now.

Keep It In The Company  (Wall Street Oasis) 

If you have to date someone, make it another banker

Google Over Goldman (Vault) 

An internship at Google or Apple is more prestigious than an internship at Goldman Sachs.

No Regrets? (Inc) 

10 things people regret about their careers. (Inc) 

Quote of the Day:

“I live in Greenwich, Connecticut. In some parts of the world, if you said, “my daddy runs a hedge fund,” I’d say, “what’s a hedge fund?” In Greenwich, Connecticut, the kids say, “what kind of hedge fund is your daddy running? Is he event arbitrage? Trend following?” a chat with Cliff Assness