Fixed Income vs Equity Research Analyst Career

Water Cooler Careers
#1

I’m an engineer pursuing an MBA at a top US university and have also completed CFA Level 3. I’m looking to break into investment management and trying to decide between Fixed Income (FI) and Equity research. Although this is not still set in stone, I would like to obtain a good clarity about pros and cons of working in each target area. I would like learned members to comment on aspects in each target area such as working style, analytical/numerical ability, career future, salary/pay, etc.

Being an engineer, I’m very strong in quant and FI naturally appeals to me due to its complexities in math. However, I want to consider all the aspects before focusing on this area.

#2

Yeah, FI people are cool, and it’s more mathy. There are mathy clients, like actuaries, if you want to go full geek. I don’t really get equity people, it seems subjective, and the analytical techniques too thin. The big drawback is most of us don’t actually personally want to invest in FI, so what I did on the job didn’t have much relevance to my own trading (equities and derivatives).

#3

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