Investment bankers are no longer fleeing banks to join hedge funds, according to a speaker from Citigroup at Reuters’ Hedge Fund and Private Equity Summit. Once seen as a certain way for investment bankers to make fast money, hedge funds may have lost their luster.
“The flow has somewhat slowed,” said Nicholas Roe, European head of equity finance at Citigroup, speaking at Reuters’ Hedge Fund and Private Equity Summit.
He said hedge funds were finding it more difficult to hire in the City of London these days because investment bank pay had risen while hedge fund performance had slowed.
“People don’t necessarily feel that running a hedge fund or moving to a hedge fund these days is a get rich quick scenario,” he said. “If anything, working for an investment bank offers some stability and you haven’t got the headache of running your own business.”
He said as a result the talent pool for new hedge funds starting out was quite thin.
“The investment banks have raised their game and given the performance of hedge funds in recent years people haven’t seen it as the pot at the end of the rainbow as they used to.”