There’s No Substitute For Crippling Hours, Emotional Abuse And The Occasional Eating Challenge

Not if you want to make it in banking or hedge funds, that is.

Author:: Jon Shazar
Updated:: Jan 14, 2019
Original:: Jun 15, 2015

Why don't you go try your hand at venture capital, loser?

So just forget about that little two-year mini-vacation of blow-off classes, networking parties, fun projects and even better internships (unless you want to go into compliance), and just keep your head down and your spreadsheets updated. Because there is no other way.

Those in European asset management and investment banking holding MBAs stand at 11% and 12% respectively, according to benchmarking website Emolument.com’s database. This is well below the private equity (20%) and venture capital (34%) sectors….One liability manager at a top-tier bank, said he weighed up the choice to study for an MBA several years ago, but opted instead to focus on his day job. He said: “The decision to work hard for a number of years was probably better for me than an MBA….” What hedge funds really value in candidates is a stellar trading record at one of the world’s top 10 banks, according to Christopher Apostolou, founder of headhunter Arbitrage Search.

MBAs still waiting for lift-off among banks and fund houses [FN]

As you all are well aware, from time to time we cover food eating challenges around these parts. We don't chronicle all the feats of gastrointestinal fortitude that come our way, though, because while we love you all, not all of your FECs constitute what we'd consider an actual challenge worth covering. As previously discussed, our high bar has everything to do with the first contest we ever wrote about (as a postmortem), which involved a man named Oyster Boy, who consumed 244 oysters in 1 hour at Ulysses, throwing down the gauntlet down for one of you to pick up, vis-à-vis goring yourself for sport. Do we really expect anyone to match OB in magnitude or strength of stomach lining? No, we do not. Having said that, "challenges" such as eating 8 vending machine items in 12 hours (or in an unlimited amount of time!) are not going to cut it. It's not an exact science but we look for FECs that are imaginative, topical, and/or represent a high degree of difficulty. (And while we wouldn't actually advise it, live streaming the whole thing would make our day.) Which brings us to today's challenge. It occurred at an investment bank in midtown and although it loses points for not letting us know ahead of time so that we could chronicle the thing in real time, there are a number of things we like about it. Intern vs. VP. [Redacted] intern's last day (ever?). A dozen donuts each from our friends at DD. 1 hour limit to finish...Intern: larger build, 6'1" and extremely ambitious. VP: fit and 5'8" with a vicious appetite. Identical donut selection includes: - 2 chocolate - 2 glazed - 1 sugar - 2 strawberry frosted - 2 chocolate frosted - 1 blueberry - 1 Oreo crumble - 1 Boston creme VP downed the whole thing in 13:31. Intern disappointingly tapped out shortly after at 9 donuts and a bite. Intern is feeling "terrible," is alternating between a sugar rush and mild depression, and wants to sleep under his desk. It's not clear what's going on in his mind and body. Besides looking very uncomfortable, he's having a hard time responding to questions with any answer besides "I don't know." He's buying drinks for everyone tonight. Obviously there's zero sense of urgency here as a result of getting a recap rather than doing it live. But! Twelve adult-sized donuts (as opposed to a bunch of munchkins)? Good. Thirteen minutes for the whole spread? Good. Pitting a superior against an underling (rather than making a couple of interns race each other)? GOOD. Take these ideas, particularly the last one and run with them. Feel free to come up with your own but at least just consider making founder vs. peasant/30 minutes/2 chocolate fountains each/70-100 items to dip/race to the finish happen.

Joachim Klement thinks you could give your money to hedge funds...or burn it. It's up to you.

You gotta spend money to make money.

June 22, 2012: To ensure that I can focus intensely on in-depth company and industry analysis, I will adopt a much lower public profile and let my investment returns speak for themselves. Specifically, I will dramatically reduce my television appearances, interviews with the media, blogging/writing, and public speaking, both in the investment and philanthropic realms. I also plan to write letters to you quarterly rather than monthly (our bookkeeper will, course, continue to send you monthly statements). July 23, 2012: From: Whitney Tilson Date: Mon, Jul 23, 2012 at 5:43 PM Subject: My favorite gadgets: laptop, phone, cameras, printers I’m a total gadget fiend, usually upgrading my laptop, phone, pocket camera, and digital SLR camera to the latest models at least once a year. In the past month, I’ve upgraded all four to newly released models and am so blown away that I wanted to share my experience (plus two printer recommendations). In order of amazingness: 1) My new laptop: the PC world FINALLY has slim, light, high-res-screen, quick-boot laptops (called ultrabooks) to rival the Macbook Air. I just bought the best of the lot, the ASUS Zenbook Prime UX31A. It’s light as a feather, boots in a few seconds, and has an AMAZINGLY high-res 13.3” screen (I don’t miss the 17” screen on my old laptop one bit). Here’s a good review of it: www.pcworld.com/article/255921/handson_asus_zenbook_prime_ux31a.html It’s only $1,080 on Amazon (more if you want a faster chip or 256GB of flash memory; I find 128GB is fine for a secondary travel computer): www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00863L2PK/tilsoncapitalpar 2) My new smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy S III, which just became available on Verizon. A couple of years ago, I added an iPhone to my Blackberry because I couldn’t give up the keyboard and found it impossible to type on the iPhone, but I didn’t like schlepping around two devices so when Verizon came out with Android phones with 30% bigger screens (plus 4G, which is MUCH faster), I junked both the Blackberry (good riddance! I had to use one in Europe last week and HATED every minute of it; until you switch, you have no idea of how awful Blackberries are) and the iPhone for the HTC Thunderbolt. No regrets, but the Thunderbolt is thick and bulky, the screen is nowhere near as good as the new iPhones, and the battery lasted maybe 1/3 of a day, so I always had to carry a spare. Thus, it was with great joy that I switched last week to the Samsung, which fixes all three of these problems: it’s super slim and light (while maintaining the large screen), the resolution appears to me to be just as good as the iPhone’s retina display, and the battery lasts most of a day with normal usage (still not great, but much better). In my opinion, this phone is much superior to the iPhone, but if you like your iPhone I wouldn’t switch until we see what the new iPhone 5 looks like. It’s rumored to be out this fall and have a bigger screen. If it’s also 4G on Verizon AND can work overseas (none of the current Verizon Android 4G phones can), then I might switch back to the iPhone. I also wouldn’t switch away from the iPhone unless you’re reasonably technologically savvy – the ecosystem isn’t quite as seamless (for example, it was quite a pain to transfer my music, esp my playlists, from iTunes on my computer to my new phone). 3) I have three kids and take zillions of photos, so I’ve become an amateur digital photo junkie. I find that I need two cameras (given that I hate the crummy photos that camera phones take): a super-small pocket one to take with me everywhere (for 90%+ of photos) and a big digital SLR camera for special occasions when small cameras just don’t cut it (weddings, bar mitzvahs, action sports, etc.). Among pocket cameras, I’ve been a very happy user for at least two years of the Canon PowerShot S90, then S95, and most recently the S100, but the new Sony DSC RX-100 blows every other pocket camera out of the water (if you’re willing to pay an extra $300). It’s maybe 5-10% bigger than the S100, but still fits easily in a pocket – and the results BLEW my mind. I thought I was using a full-size SLR: no shutter lag, amazing many-frames-per-second action shots, brilliant pictures in low light without a flash, etc. Below is the review by the NYT’s David Pogue, who concludes: This is an ideal second camera for professionals. And it’s a great primary camera for any amateur who wants to take professional-looking photos without having to carry a camera bag. Of course, $650 is crazy expensive. You can buy a full-blown S.L.R. for that much. But every time you transfer a batch of its pictures to your computer, you’ll understand why you spent that money. You’ll click through them, astonished at how often it’s successful in stopping time, capturing the emotion of a scene, enshrining a memory or an expression you never want to forget. You’ll appreciate that the RX100 has single-handedly smashed the rule that said, “You need a big camera for pro-quality photos.” And if you care at all about your photography, you’ll thank Sony for giving the camera industry a good hard shove into the future. The quality of the camera is reflected in its price, however: the cheapest I could find it on the internet is $605 here: www.provantage.com/sony-dscrx100-b~7SNYG07U.htm. If that’s too expensive for you, go with the Canon S100 for $335 here: http://bestpricephoto.com/h/product_info.php/canon-powershot-s100-digital-camera-p-20660 4) I also recently upgraded my digital SLR from the Nikon D5100 to the D7000, which is the highest end amateur camera in the Nikon line. The D5100 was buggy so I was pleased to be rid of it. The key with both of these cameras is to get the Nikkor 18-200mm lens – it’s 11x with digital image stabilization built in. It’s the only lens you need, so just buy the camera body plus this lens. The best price I found for the D7000 is $889 at: http://bestpricephoto.com/h/product_info.php/nikon-d7000-162-mp-digital-slr-camera-body-p-19926. The best price on the lens is $847 at: www.buydig.com/shop/product.aspx?sku=NK18200G2 PS—I use and recommend the free Google photo software, Picasa (www.picasa.com), for cropping, editing, getting rid of red-eye, emailing photos (with the photos embedded, not attached), etc. Last but not least, printers: 1) If you want to print photos, I highly recommend a specialized photo printer rather than using an all-in-one inkjet – the quality difference is HUGE. I haven’t upgraded mine in a while, but if I were to buy one, I’d just buy the latest model of my current one (the 4500), the Canon iP4920, which is a mere $80 (they get you on the paper and ink – don’t try generics): www.buydig.com/shop/product.aspx?sku=CNIP4920 2) Complementing my photo printer in my home office is my color laser, the Brother MFC-9560CDW Multifunction Printer for $590 at: www.nextwarehouse.com/item/?999165. It’s a great scanner, copier, fax machine, and prints fast in color and B&W IN DUPLEX (two-sided), which is a must-have for me.

BullBalls

A toast to the good guys.

As Dealbreaker historians will recall, last March marked our first Dealbreaker NCAA Tournament Challenge. It was inspired by a financial services hack who made the public announcement that he planned to (anonymously) report any colleagues he caught filling out brackets and keeping tabs on their picks during business hours. At the time, we encouraged you all to enter as many pools as were available, making it impossible for him to keep up with the amount of people and their offenses he needed to rat out, and created one to do our part. Is this guy still on the loose? He very well might be but regardless: never forget. To that end, sign up for the Second Annual Dealbreaker NCAA Tournament Challenge today. If you need reason beyond being able to say you won the DBNCAATC, first place will receive dinner for him/herself plus some colleagues and/friends at Peter Luger's, an outing funded by us,* a Greenlight Capital messenger bag, a Pershing Square golf umbrella, a pair of Third Point-branded running sneakers, and an I Heart Dealbreaker button.** The pool will once again be managed by Dealbreaker Commenter and Friend NakedShort, who, along with myself, will answer any questions you might have, provide color if warranted (rip everyone’s brackets to shreds, call out the bottom 5 performers), etc. Sign up here now.*** So it is abundantly clear, if you do not want participants to know your real name, MAKE SURE TO FILL OUT SOMETHING ELSE IN THE NAME FIELDS. For example, if your ID is Godswork, rather than writing Lloyd B, enter first name: Gods, last name: work. To that end, if you don’t want people to see your email address, from the bracket page, click ‘options’ and then ‘hide email.’ If you feel it necessary, create an entirely new email account specifically for this challenge. Finally, don’t use HisHoliness as your ID because Alan Greenspan’s already called dibs. The pool password is: animalliar Dealbreaker NCAA Tournament Challenge [CBS Sports] *Last year we offered Wall Street North favorite Beamers Cafe, but the winner had "already seen all Beamers had to offer," and choose an alternative venue. This year, feel free to think outside the box. **If any other hedge funds, private equity firms, or banks would like to be represented via swag, feel free to get in touch! ***NakedShort says you have until Thursday morning to fill out a bracket but you should just get on this ASAP.

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