what's up everyone kenji here and in this video i thought i'd share five career options
in finance so this is actually a part two video i made a part one a couple weeks back
and a lot of you requested a follow-up video so here it goes
so the five jobs i've picked are quants investment analysts financial advisors
commercial bankers and brokers i'm mainly going to be focusing on entry level as well as well as
a couple years down the line and we'll be looking at things like their work life balance the skills
required the salary and also be providing some examples of companies in each category so you
can look further if you want to apply to them and just like the part one video if this video does
well i will consider making a part three where i cover other jobs like private banking or portfolio
management so make sure you hit that like and subscribe all right let's get into the video
so the first job we'll be looking at is quants which is short for quantitative analysts
so this role consists of creating algorithms and statistical models specifically to solve problems
in the financial markets and as you can imagine their backgrounds are in fields like physics
computer science or mathematics now this role is actually relatively new and it's increasingly high
in demand especially as the finance industry has transitioned into more computer based
now within the quant world there's actually many different roles some are more focused
on risk management so trying to control the risk of certain trades others are more focused
on algorithmic trading so trying to develop an algorithm that will trade in the financial markets
for them while there's many other roles like front office squads library quants and so on but that's
maybe for another video and all sorts of financial institutions employ quants so the investments the
asset managers and so on but the most famous ones are probably the quantitative hedge funds
so these are the likes of the show citadel or two sigma and as for the skills required for this kind
of a role it's obviously quite numerical most of these people know how to code already and it's
not uncommon to have advanced level degrees so the likes of a master's or a phd although it's usually
not required now it's for good reason that they're called the rocket scientists of wall street
as for the pay it's extremely high especially because they're in high demand and at the same
time they also complete with the big tech firms which are also known to pay a lot
so let's say around 120 000 in a big financial city like new york is not unheard of when it comes
to the hours they're actually not as short as some people might expect i'd say it's more like a 12
hour day so 16 hours a week now it is longer than the average 40 hour work week but at the same time
they are compensated quite well so this brings us to our next role which is an investment analyst
and ironically enough they don't actually invest money themselves that's usually done by the trader
instead what they do has to do with analyzing data researching and creating presentations for the
portfolio manager or the investment manager was basically their boss and there's tons of different
companies that employ investment analysts from asset managers like blackrock to investment banks
like goldman sachs to even insurance companies like axa as well overall there is a big split
between the buy side and the sell side so buy side is looking to invest money while the sell
side is about doing research for the broker to sell securities to clients but because investment
analyst is actually such a vague title they usually specialize in a specific asset geography
or even industry so for instance you might have an investment analyst that's dealing with government
bonds in the us another one that only deals with tech stocks in the uk and so on and so forth
as for the work hours around 50 hours a week is normal so it's nothing outrageous say but at
the same time you got to keep in mind that it is quite a high pressure environment when it comes to
dealing with money right as far as skills required spreadsheets so excel skills are usually one of
the big ones as well as general finance as well as accounting at the same time you do have to present
so presentation skills can come handy as well when it comes to the designation the cfa is very very
popular here some jobs as investment analysts that you might look to apply to if it might require say
having at least a level one or something like that in the cfa there's actually three different levels
before you get to the full certificate or the full designation as far as salary i'd say around
75 000 is a good rough guide but you got to keep in mind that it is a very big industry and there's
many different roles so it may vary depending on that next up is the financial advisor role
and in short this is all about advising clients on what they should do with their own money
it's also sometimes called a financial planner and a typical example of what they might have to do is
say you're looking to retire by the time you're 60 years old so they look through your taxes your
insurance your billings and so all of the other money related stuff and try to make an estimate
of how much you should be saving how much you should be spending and so on among the big pros
of this kind of a role is that if you do things well you can really have a positive impact on some
people right on the other hand on the coin side if your recommendations don't work out and they
end up losing money that can obviously be very stressful so uh you got uh you got my money huh oh
yeah i'll pay you soon at the same time if you're just starting off it's always very very hard to
get your first few clients especially because you don't actually have any experience yourself right
so that can be a hard start i'd say when it comes to the work hours especially as you move later on
it does become quite flexible so it depends on what the client's needs are but at the first
couple years i'd say around 50 hours 50 to 60 hours is quite common the skills for this kind
of a role are obviously finance but at the same time a lot of the interpersonal communication
as well as sales skills are very important right at the end of the day you're trying to
persuade them that you can handle their money so you really need to convey some trust there
when it comes to designations the chartered financial planner is probably the most common
one but it's not uncommon to also have the cfa or the cpa as well salary wise it's usually a
combination of a fee and a commission the fee is basically for managing the money every year
so they might take something like one percent for instance and on the other hand there's a
commission for using their products sometimes some advisors only do fees or they only do commissions
as well so salary wise it's actually going to vary quite a lot depending on that so for
instance if you have a lot of commission revenue then that salary is obviously going to be boosted
same goes if you have a lot of clients and there's a lot of fees for you but overall i'd say around
60 000 is a good estimate among the big names when it comes to financial advisors are fidelity
state street as well as vanguard all right moving on to commercial banking and if you don't know
what commercial banking is in short it's just two main things number one has to do with offering
deposits and number two has to do with lending money to people like you and i say and companies
of all sizes so small medium and large usually if you're fresh out of college you'll start off
as a credit analyst and in this kind of a role you're providing clients with credit products like
term loans lines of credit mortgages and other products like that and the goal here is obviously
for them to be able to pay you back right so you're looking through their credit history their
financial statements spending habits and so on and based on that assessing whether they'll be able to
pay the bank back as you can probably imagine the skills for this kind of a role are quite numerical
so excel math and finance knowledge can definitely come handy a common designation
to work towards is the credit risk certification when it comes to hours i'd say around 50 hours a
week is quite normal so i don't think that's anything outrageous salary wise around 70
000 dollars a year is a good estimate now when it comes to the types of companies out there um it's
basically all of the different commercial banks that you see out on the street right so in the us
that's probably the likes of chase bank of america or capital one overall people do regard commercial
banking as quite a stable career in which there's a good work-life balance and it does have quite a
competitive pay as well now if you want to learn more about the differences between a commercial
bank and an investment bank i have made another video just on that so you can go somewhere up here
where i'll leave it linked and the last job we look at is a broker and in short a broker buys
and sells securities on behalf of the client's wishes so these securities can range from shares
to bonds to options and much more than that now at this point you might wonder well what's the
difference between a broker and a trader basically i am simplifying a bit here but a broker executes
trades on behalf of the client's wishes once a trader executes trades on behalf of the portfolio
manager or the investment manager's wishes so a broker does have a lot more of a people element
as well because there's obviously many different clients that he or she handles right when it comes
to the hours it's not your average 40 hour work week it does start very very early in the morning
primarily because the markets open quite early right so in the us it starts at 9 30 the market
open time so i have to be in there quite a few hours in advance in order to get everything ready
have the research ready um catch up on the news and so on and so forth overall around 55 hours i'd
say it's a good estimate and you've got to keep in mind that these hours where they're working are
actually very very stressful especially when the markets open as there's a lot of money to be made
or loss free when it comes to the pay there is a big myth that all stock brokers are millionaires
that's probably because of the wolf of wall street but realistically as an entry level broker you'll
probably be making around 60 thousand dollars and then there is a high upside though depending
on how much you can earn off commission so there is a good potential in that sense among the most
useful skills are communication working well under pressure especially when the market is
open and sales because mainly they depend on them for earning a commission right when it comes to
licenses the series 7 as well as the series 63 are some of the main ones primarily because they give
you the authority to trade on behalf of clients when it comes to companies there's actually a
big split between what's known as a full service broker and a discount broker a full service broker
does provide investment advice as well so they might do some research for you they might analyze
things for you as well whilst they discount broker it doesn't do any of that instead it just
does the trade right overall obviously a full service broker does have a higher commission
than a discount one for those obvious reasons but some examples of full service brokers include city
or morgan stanley while some examples of discount brokers could be fidelity or child schwab as well
so those are five when it comes to salaries do take it as a bit of a rough guide mainly
because it depends on a city you're in and other things like that and same goes for the work hours
because well you might have a bad boss and that makes you work longer than usual right
also do let me know in the comments if you'd like me to explain some other jobs or maybe
even have a part three lastly go follow me on instagram for some behind the scenes footage
and getting to know me a bit more personally if you want to hope you found the video useful
if you did feel free to like and subscribe and i'll hopefully catch you in the next one