AboutWarren Boroson Expertise Author of "Keys to Investing in Mutual Funds" (Barrons) and "Ultimate Mutual Fund Guide" (Probus). Columnist for Gannett News Service.
Experience Author of 20 books; winner of 1996 Personal Finance award from Investment Company Institute and Washington University. Formerly on staffs of Money and Sylvia Porter's Magazine. Had a radio program (on WEVD)about mutual funds and a newsletter, FundDigest.
Question QUESTION: Hello I am in high school. When i graduate i want to start a hedge fund. Ive looked at profiles of major hedge fund managers and most attended top colleges. I am not a great high school student and dont expect to be accepted to harvard or columbia. What should i do?? I am a stock market wiz kid tho and get great returns 200% some years others 100% or higher. Im in 10th grade and read college level books on the stock market graham,siegel,fisher etc. I was also thinking if i went to a decent college for my B.A. and then to a goooder college for my MBA in finance and possibly a PHD in economics and a CFA lvl 3 well please respond thank you.
ANSWER: Dear Vladimir--
While some hedge fund managers make out like bandits, they help only a small percentage of society--the already very rich. Also, they usually don't become as celebrated as mutual fund managers, such as Mario Gabelli or Bill Gross. In fact, their reputations tend to be down in the gutter. Besides which, there happens to be a glut of hedge funds out there.
If your investment prowess is as formidable as you indicate, you should do well just managing money. Forget about a PhD--unless you want to teach. After going to a decent college, see if you can get a job with a good firm, such as Fidelity, T. Rowe Price, Franklin, or Dodge & Cox.
Good luck!
Warren
---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------
QUESTION: Would you say i should look into becoming a stock broker first and gaining
some experience + clients?? And then going to work for another firm like t
rowe price?? thank you bye
Answer Dear Vladimir:
It's hard to say.
By going directly to a fine firm like T. Rowe Price, you may rise high in the ranks--thanks to your seniority (assuming that you remain there). Vanguard, Fidelity, and other money-management firms are similarly high class. I've always envied people who worked for Vanguard. A real class act.
But...there are benefits to having a varied career. For one thing, your experience and skills should become wider. And your life will likely to turn out to be more interesting.
When I started my own career as a reporter at a newspaper, the (Bergen Evening) Record, in my 20s, the chief editorial writer (William Caldwell) wanted to groom me to be his successor. If I had agreed, I could have spent my entire career there--and retired wealthy and no doubt happy.
I chose to have a more varied career, a more varied life.
After leaving the Bergen Record, I worked for Precis, a place that placed PR pieces around the country; Pageant, a general-interest magazine, where I wrote such pieces as why blondes have more fund and a piece about the actress in the film, the Passion of Joan of Arc; the PR department of Western Electric (then part of AT&T); Medical Economics magazine; Fact magazine (getting myself sued by Barry Goldwater); Avant-Garde, a wild far-out magazine, where I wrote a neat hatchet job on Richard M. Nixon; Trans-action, a sociological magazine; Next, a future-oriented magazine; the Daily Record, a Gannett newspaper. Oh, and Sylvia Porter's Personal Finance Magazine, where I got to write some of Sylvia's books and financial columns.
Of course, it's not so simple a choice. After I left the Bergen Record, I came back! And left again!
But overall, I'm pleased to have had a varied career.
Of course, another consideration is that it may be easier for you to find a job as a stockbroker than as an employee of a fine firm like T. Rowe Price.
