9 December , 2011

Here is my updated list of Julia Robertson’s Tiger Cubs…If anyone has any additions, please email me at hunter [at] distressed-debt-investing [dot] come

Tiger Management – Julian Robertson

• Blue Ridge Capital – John Griffin
  • Bridger Management – Roberto Mignone
    • Valinor Management – David Gallo
• Maverick Capital – Lee Ainslie
  • Highside Capital Management – Lee Hobson
  • Impala Asset Management – Robert Bishop
• Viking Global Investors – Andreas Halvorsen
  • Tiger Eye Capital – Benjamin Gambill
  • Hoplite Capital – John Lykouretzos
• Touradji Capital – Paul Touradji
• Lone Pine Capital – Stephen Mandel
  • White Elm Capital – Matthew Iorio
  • Conatus Capital – David Stemerman
• Shumway Capital Partners (Chris Shumway)
  • Suranya Capital Partners – Anu Murgai
  • JAT Capital – John Thaler
• Toscafund – Martin Hughes
• Second Curve Capital – Tom Brown
• Coatue Capital Management – Philippe Laffont
• Ridgefield Capital Management – Robert Ellis
• Discovery Capital Management – Rob Citrone
• Longhorn Capital Partners – Kris Kristynik
• Healthcor – Arthur B Cohen
• Pantera Capital Management – Dan Morehead
• Millgate Capital – James Lyle
• Intrepid Capital Management – Steve Shapiro
• Argonaut Capital Management – David Gerstenhaber
• Elmwood Advisors – Quinn Riordan
• Deerfield Capital – Arnold Snider
• Duff Capital Advisors – Philip Duff
  • North Sound Capital (Rolled into Duff Capital) – Tom McAuley
• Joho Capital – Robert Karr
• Roundrock Capital Management – Peter Vig
• Speedwell – Fuyuki Fujiwara
• Williamson McAree Investment Partners – Ed McAree & Robert Williamson
• Asian Century Quest – Brian Kelly
• Sun Valley Gold – Peter Palmedo
• Cascabel Management – Scott Sinclair
• Light Street Capital – Glen Kacher
• Sureview Capital – John Wu

Tiger Management v 2.0

• Tiger Global – Chase Coleman
• Tiger Asia – Bill Hwang
  • Kylin Management – Ted Kang
• Tiger Shark Management – Tom Facciola & Michael Sears
• Tiger Consumer – Patrick McCormack
• Tiger Veda – Manish Chopra
• Torrey Pines Capital Management – Robert Jafek
• Fox Point Capital Management –Charles Anderson
• Axial Capital Management – Eliav Assouline
• Miura Global Management – Pasco Alfaro
• WRA Investment – William Araskog
• Hound Partners – Jonathan Auerback
• Goshen Investments – Christopher Burns
• Apos Capital Management – Alok Agrawal
• Centurion Global – Michael Popow
• DLH Capital Management – Rodrigo Andrade
• Eastern Advisors – Scott Booth
• Emerging Sovreign Group – J Kevin Kenny Jr
• Firemark Advisors – Michael Morrissey
• Kelusa Capital – RJ McCreary
• Lanexa Global Management – Ian Murray
• Maple Leaf Partners – Dane Andreef
• Pelagic Capital – McAndrew Rudisill
• Venesprie Capital Management – Quincy Fennebresque
• Steadfast Capital – Robert Pitts
• Marble Arch Investments – Tim Jenkins
• Japan Advisory – Edward Brogan
• Plural Investments – Matt Grossman
• Long Oar – James Davidson
• Tiger Ratan – Nehal Chopra
• Cacabel – Scott Sinclair
• Teewinot – Michael Moriarty

5 January , 2011

One of the first questions I like to ask clients when starting to work them with our hedge fund resume service is “What are you trying to accomplish with this resume?”  More often that not, the resumes I see being sent to recruiters as well as those I see on my desk when hiring for positions internally, can be summarized as paper full of a bunch of activities and duties you did at previous jobs.

In my mind, this is not the way to approach a resume targeted to getting a buy side job.  What question will a hedge fund manager be thinking about when reviewing your resume?

• Will this person have the work ethic to keep up with the demands of this job?
• Is this person intelligent / fast learner / adaptable to change and dynamic markets?
• Can I trust this person with analytical work?  Will he/she be able to present his investment ideas cohesively and coherently?
• Will this person make us money?

There may be a few more specific to certain types of funds, but the questions above are those that your resume should be answering with a resounding affirmative.  The reader should have NO doubt in his/her mind that you can help the fund generate excess returns.

I hesitated when I first entitled this post.  I, in no way shape or form, want to see the word “Objective” on your resume.  More often than not, that objective section will be at the very top of the resume which is incredibly valuable real estate.  Save the “Objective” for your cover letter or your introductory email to funds / recruiters.  For the resume, YOUR objective should be answering those questions above.  How do you go about doing that?

Without giving too much of our proprietary system away, you want to demonstrate to the reader through the use of concrete examples that you have an insatiable work ethic, you need very little training, you have incredible attention to detail and communication skills, and without a shadow of a doubt: you can pick stocks and bonds with the best of them.

Over the next few months, I plan on updating this site significantly more frequently that in previous  months.  I plan on touching topics like hedge fund compensation, hiring trends among various strategies, new fund launches etc.  For those interested in our hedge fund resume service as well as a case study service we will be launching in February, please send me an email

10 November , 2010

Later this week, we are officially launching a service to help hedge fund candidates and applicants to tailor their resumes and beef up their case studies so they can move forward to their goals of attaining a job at a hedge fund.  Stay tuned!

3 October , 2010

To start, I would like to open up my commentary to not solely hedge fund jobs, but also to the more general, “buy side jobs.” I will lop all research analysts, traders, and portfolio managers at mutual funds, insurance companies, endowments, etc into this category. In my opinion, for many of you looking to make the jump to a hedge fund career and are having difficulty, you might want to start looking for the more general buy side jobs and then making the switch 2 years down the line.

When I pull up the JOBS function on Bloomberg, and look for hedge fund jobs, I see a lot of job listings specifically looking for people with buy side experience. Why?

I think there are three main reasons:

1. People with buy side experience have experienced profit and loss on individual investment recommendations which (in my opinion) better sharpens your skill set than having a “Buy” recommendation flop.
2. People with front – office buy side experience will have more familiarity with middle and back office processes (CDX rolls, trade breaks, etc) that a small to medium sized hedge fund might need as their infrastructure may only consist of a CFO.
3. People with buy side experience can come into a situation and have a number of recommendations ready to go.

Now, you might look at point 3 and say: “Won’t the sell side analyst have that as well?” Possibly – but a sell side analyst may have many reasons for putting a buy on a situation. I am not saying the sell side is biased to secure investment banking revenue – but it does make you raise an eyebrow. In addition, when the sell side puts a sell on a company, they may be shut out from even speaking with management. Just another reasons why I think the sell side leads more towards the “Buy” rating.

With that in hand, where can you find these buy side opportunities? The credit markets are crazy right now and honestly it’s not hedge fund money doing the buying. It’s high yield and investment grade mutual funds, its insurance companies, it’s index funds, etc. Let me list 8 kinds of places where you can secure front – office buy side experience:

1. Traditional mutual fund/Asset management company. Probably the best place to get your feet wet, but sometimes just as hard to break into (and even hard) for the Tier 1 firms (Franklin, Legg Mason, Fidelity)
2. CLO manager. Fantastic place to get work if you want to move to the credit / distressed world. Unfortunately, lots of consolidation combined with a broke securitization market has caused the number of jobs to dry up.
3. Insurance Company. Very good place to get experience but (depending on the place) can limit your investment options (i.e. little equities, can’t go short). Of course if you were going to Markel or Fairfax, I’d say it would be the best option on the list
4. Endowment. Very often a lot of “fund of funds” business but that gives you an opportunity to meet many people in the investment world. Some endowments take individual investment risk and these places can be great because there is just SO MUCH MONEY.
5. “Trading Shops”. I do not have a better word for it. These places traders trade the house money and get a small cut. Good if you enjoy day trading. I would avoid places asking you to put up capital as well.
6. Private Equity. Incredible to have on your resume, but also just as hard to get involved in as hedge funds.
7. Family Office. A good combination of many of the shops above. I have two friends at two different family offices and both love it. Make sure you get involved with one doing individual investments versus just allocating to funds.
8. RIA / Investment Advisor / Seperate Account Manager. Unfortunately, I do not know many people at these sorts of places so hard for me to comment.

Now, there may be more – but this is a good list for those that are having difficult securing hedge fund interviews because of a lack of buy side experience.

28 July , 2010

A question I often get asked when candidates are applying to various buy side positions (including hedge fund jobs) is whether it is better to come from a generalist background, whether that be product group from an investment bank (i.e. leveraged finance) or from a specific industry group, whether that be on the banking or research side.  In my opinion it really depends on what kind of hedge fund you want to join / be a part of.

A lot of the smaller funds rely on generalists to cover a lot of industries.  These people will have a very good understanding of valuation but there industry contacts / insights will not be as deep.  At larger funds, I think coming from a specific industry can be invaluable.  And since most people that visit here are looking to join “name brand” funds, I am going to focus on this industry expertise and how you can use it as leverage to secure your hedge fund job.

Typically people trying to make it to the hedge fund world would investment banking analysts, recent MBA graduates, other buy side (including hedge fund) professionals, and sell side analysts.  All of theses categories can do what I am about to explain – In my opinion though, the sell side analyst will have the biggest advantage at this point just for his/her ability to try reach management teams.

Before we get started, we need to pick an industry.  I am going to use the shipping industry because it’s one I have never personally covered to any real extent.

First, let’s find the 5 companies in this space: Go to a Bloomberg and type: NSE Shipping <GO>.  Look for a company in the space…I see Teekay.  Pull up Teekay in Bloomberg and type: PVH <GO>.  Now we are getting somewhere.  This list shows the Bloomberg Peers of Teekay.  Jot all those down (It’s a long list):

A P MOLLER – MAERSK A/S – B MISC BHD MITSUI OSK LINES LTD FRONTLINE LTD KIRBY CORP TEEKAY CORP D/S NORDEN SHIP FINANCE INTL LTD NORDIC AMER TANKER SHIPPING DRYSHIPS INC OVERSEAS SHIPHOLDING GROUP AEGEAN MARINE PETROLEUM NETW DIANA SHIPPING INC NAVIOS MARITIME PARTNERS LP SEASPAN CORP GOLAR LNG LTD GENCO SHIPPING & TRADING LTD NAVIOS MARITIME HOLDINGS INC TEEKAY TANKERS LTD-CLASS A TSAKOS ENERGY NAVIGATION LTD GENERAL MARITIME CORP SAFE BULKERS INC EXCEL MARITIME CARRIERS LTD KNIGHTSBRIDGE TANKERS LTD EAGLE BULK SHIPPING INC CAPITAL PRODUCT PARTNERS LP BALTIC TRADING LTD DANAOS CORP DHT HOLDINGS INC OMEGA NAVIGATION ENT-CLASS A FRONTLINE CORPORATION LTD
Now what I would do is note the names and number of each companies’ CFO and Investor Relations.   If you have capital IQ you can make this process less cumbersome.   If you can’t find the IR contacts name, it will be on their website.

With company names, CFO and IR names and numbers, it is start figuring out what analyst covers these guys.   Again using TK as an example type TK EQUITY ANR <GO>.  This pulls up all the analysts that cover TK.   On Bloomberg, you can click through the analyst’s name to get their number as well (as well as other credits they own).   Note these names down.  And then go back to some of the other companies (the ones with the largest market caps will have the most coverage generally) and take down names and numbers of other analysts as well.

Now, start researching.  Read a bunch of 10Ks and Investor Presentations.  Get an understanding of the business.  AND THEN START DIALING.  Talk to as many of these people as you can – if they blow you off – who cares – Do not just TAKE value, also give value.  For example, if you are talking to XYZ CFO you can say something like “I probably shouldn’t be telling you this, but I was talking to ABC CFO last week and he said shipping rates in the Mediterranean are weak” … You get the gist.

After your first round of calls, I would say you probably should have interacted with 50% of the list.  And do you know what you do now?  You call them again next month and the month after.  You ask about industry events these people are attending, or conferences, or trade magazines.  Once you get into the thick of it, your contacts will increase exponentially.

And that is how you get industry knowledge and a deep industry contact list.  It’s simple but VERY few people that read this will go out and do the work necessary.  No emails either – dial for dollars.

I once went into an interview and the second question I was asked was: “Who do you talk to in the retail space?”  I listed the vendors, CEOs, CFOs, IR professionals, reporters, sell side and buy side analysts that I knew in retail.  Not only did I list them, but I provided color on what these people were saying about the industry.  That is valuable information.  Information is the most valuable commodity?  I think so.  Do this work, and next time when you go into a hedge fund job interview, you will be prepared to blow them away with your industry knowledge and contact list.