Associate Investment Director

Department Description

The Investment Directing team commercialise Fidelity's fixed income investment solutions and the company's investment capabilities. It represents the link between the Investment team and our clients.

The role of Investment Directing can be broken down in three categories:

Understand and extract client needs: This involves regular contacts with end clients, from 1:1 to larger groups with the aim of identifying current and future needs. It also requires a deep understanding of the industry dynamic, what peers are doing and what technology will make possible in the future.

Deliver solutions to fulfil those needs: Based on our client needs, we will either suggest off-the-shelf investment products or design tailored solutions in collaboration with multiple internal departments, most prevalently, our Product Development team. This category also includes the marketing of existing or new solutions.

Ensure a pleasant client experience with those solutions: This encompasses regular reporting on the performance of our funds, the provision of market updates and outlook as well as the crafting of though-leadership pieces. Channels are various, including 1:1 meetings, stage presentations, written pieces, video shootings or podcasts.

The team encompasses a strong knowledge of bond markets and Fidelity's portfolio strategies, combined with a capacity to communicate these in a convincing matter.

The Investment Directing team forms integral part of the investment team, along Portfolio Managers, Traders, Credit Analysts and Quantitative Analysts, and offers a unique platform for the candidates to get exposure across the whole spectrum of roles within Fixed Income, including but not limited to Sales, Marketing and Product Development.

Fixed Income Investment Directing forms part of the Fixed Income Team, reporting to the CIO of Fixed Income. This team manages in excess of $US 100 billion of fixed income portfolios on behalf of institutional, wholesale and retail clients globally. The team in London is closely integrated with its Asian counterpart based in Hong Kong, Singapore and Tokyo.

Purpose of your role

• The individual would represent the fixed income franchise in building relationships with existing and prospective clients, covering a range of fixed income product types and working in collaboration with Fidelity's distribution teams.
• The individual will support the fixed income Investment Directing team with various tasks and goals, including: existing funds analysis, production of pitch books, peer reviews, marketing collateral and input for the RFP/RFI team. It requires the development of a deep knowledge of all aspects of the process, team, performance and investment strategy for all fixed income disciplines.

• The individual would support client service by providing client updates across various fixed income disciplines. Depending on the level of seniority and previous experience, client servicing would include meeting with existing clients or pension trustees on investments in pooled funds and signing off core marketing and reporting material.

• In driving business growth, the individual would be expected to work closely with portfolio managers and investment specialists in shaping the Fixed Income investment message, identifying product demand trends and areas of focus.

• The individual would be expected to contribute on thought-leadership article, white papers on thematic issues affecting institutional and wholesale clients, and represent Fidelity Fixed Income in marketing forums.

• The individual is expected to have exceptional technical knowledge of Fixed Income markets and instruments, portfolio construction and asset allocation. As this role is also expected to help educate Fidelity Sales forces and provided regular market and portfolio updates, the ability to write concisely, in total respect of English grammar and with a desire to surprise and entertain, is a pre-requisite.
• The individual is expected to be a self-starter, with ability to generate materials and analysis with limited support. Relationship building is essential, as are strong communication skills, across written and presentational formats.

This position will report to the Hong Kong-based Asia Team Leader of Fixed Income Investment. The main partners will be the other Investment Directors, Portfolio Managers, Traders, Credit Analysts, the Marketing teams, the Product Development team, the Distribution teams, the consultants relations and the India-based Investment Fund Analysts.

Experience and Qualifications Required

• A strong theoretical and practical understanding of fixed income instruments, analysis and portfolio management techniques is required.
• Educated to minimum Graduate level, preferably with post-graduate/professional qualifications (e.g. CFA and CAIA).
• Solid presentation skill, ability to actively listen and desire to convince based on facts.
• Analytical / problem solving skills, with a logical thought process - to sort, analyse and interpret large amount of qualitative and quantitative data.
• Excellent spoken and written English; additional language skills, in particular Mandarin, is an advantage.
• Competent in data manipulation, performance and attribution interpretation; Impeccable attention to detail and accuracy.
• Ability to work effectively under pressure and tight deadlines; formal training in project management is beneficial.
• A knowledge of programming languages (e.g. Python) is beneficial as is a proven interest for emerging technologies (e.g. distributed ledger technology).