lionel - you want to be an analyst. Trust me. Take the CFA exams, and then maybe CMT or CAIA. A lot of companies like guys with IT experience.



You do NOT want to be an advisor.



Btw - By the time you are done with those programs, you won’t want to listen to the talking heads anymore.

Yep, what he said.
Being an advisor is sales and service.

+!

I sure it’s like the mafia but I had a few indy friends really push me to become a floor trader when I expressed interest in this field.

L, the reason these guys said you don’t want to go the retail route is you’ll spend NO time checking out the ticker.  You pay guys to do that for you because you are busy building a business. 

Thanks for the responses everyone. I don’t have an economics degree or any accounting experience, just a BS in Information Tech. Can anyone recommend some resources for looking into the analyst field ?

If you want to be an advisor and want to give it a go then do it.  You’ll find out fast if its for you or not.  Then if you want to stay in the industry but as an analyst or something else, you can branch out that way. 

[quote=lionel] Thanks for the responses everyone. I don’t have an economics degree or any accounting experience, just a BS in Information Tech. Can anyone recommend some resources for looking into the analyst field ?

I will disagree a bit here. All the advice here is great advice, advisors face a notoriously high failure rate. With that, the first few years of your career as an advisor will be spent cold calling, knocking on doors, attending networking events, and putting on seminars, not doing a whole lot with the market.

However, as you establish a client base and you need to prospect less, you can spend more time studying the markets for the benefit of you clients. I have found some very smart advisors both posting on this board and in my sphere of influence that do a lot of market study and have a keen understanding of the markets.

Anyway, just understand that being an advisor is client first, market second, though that does not exclude market. I imagine (I don’t know any CFA’s personally) that analysts spend very little time with people outside of making presentations of their research, and the rest crunching numbers and doing research. If you like dealing with people, that may not be the route for you.

Lionel - I’ll respectfully disagree with Sometimes here. Analysts actually spend a lot of time outside of the office doing research, speaking with accounting firms, dealing with the companies they cover. Also, you are more likely to BE on of the talking heads on TV if you are an analyst.



That said, if you want to go the advisor route, listen to Baldy. You’ll get some of the best training around at EJ. Just take it for what it is though, don’t drink too deeply of the kool-aid, and you’ll be fine.



Of course it is your decision, but I think if you LOVE the market, the advisor route is not for you. I thought I liked dealing with clients, but you spend most of your time as a financial psychologist when dealing with clients and not really getting nitty gritty with the market.

[quote=Moraen]Lionel - I’ll respectfully disagree with Sometimes here. Analysts actually spend a lot of time outside of the office doing research, speaking with accounting firms, dealing with the companies they cover. Also, you are more likely to BE on of the talking heads on TV if you are an analyst.



That said, if you want to go the advisor route, listen to Baldy. You’ll get some of the best training around at EJ. Just take it for what it is though, don’t drink too deeply of the kool-aid, and you’ll be fine.



Of course it is your decision, but I think if you LOVE the market, the advisor route is not for you. I thought I liked dealing with clients, but you spend most of your time as a financial psychologist when dealing with clients and not really getting nitty gritty with the market.

[/quote]

Hadn’t thought about that.

And that is very true.

Be careful about Jones, though. I work with EDJ, and they will train you how to do their brand of selling, but teach you very little about “the market”. You will need to learn yourself here, which it sounds you already have an interest in.

Seems like both routes are a head first jump into water? I guess the one question I have though is who likes the job? I’ll have a look a both careers. Both appear to have equal plus and minuses on the surface. One thing I know, I don’t think I want to be in IT anymore. The last job did me in for that.