what's the skill set for asset management?

[littlelady]

i was told that asset management was less programming intensive but involved more statistics/probabilities, at least interview-wise. Is that true? Thx.

 

[Ken Abbott]

It's all about tracking error, mean/variance analysis, and asset allocation. Buy side is usually a bit more macro-driven.

 

[FedericoM]

So Ken, which course between Advanced Statistic or PDE provides a useful background to work in Asset Management?

Thanks.

 

[Ken Abbott]

For asset management, I'd say statistics. I've had dozens of Markowitz -type conversations with our AM people. I can't remember ever talking about PDEs. Besides, many asset managers will shy away from derivatives beyond simple swaps.

 

[Joy Pathak]

I think it depends on what sort of positions. If you go for the big asset managers like Blackrock they basically have several departments like a bank and need all sorts of skill sets like developers, research, operations, etc etc. But the focus does seem to be more global macro then quant trading.

The smaller firms, definitely would focus more on a nice overall skill set which should include strong understanding of capital markets and optimization, statistics, macro economics and so on.