Simeka: Investment Research Analyst (JHB)

Simeka: Investment Research Analyst (JHB)

Date: 18 Sep 2024 Location: Sandton, Gauteng, ZA Who are we? Sanlam Corporate forms part of the Sanlam Group which offers retail and corporate life insurance, health and investment products in South Africa. Our vision is to be the preferred partner to Corporate and Public Sector by providing an awesome client experience and comprehensive solutions that enable the financial resilience and prosperity of those entities and their employees. We tap into over 100 years of expertise to provide cost-effective Employee Benefits and Healthcare Solutions that enable financial confidence for our members. We enable our clients to make better retirement and risk decisions today through determined and passionate thought leadership and best-in-class people, innovative products and proven processes all designed to help people live a better life tomorrow. We believe in creating and cultivating a positive, energised working environment that gives every individual the opportunity to achieve success by embracing diversity and growing our talent. We’re all about building strong, lasting relationships with our employees. We know that you have hopes for your future – your career, your personal development and of achieving great things. We pride ourselves in helping our employees to realise their worth.

What will you do?

Research analyst role within an experienced and dynamic investment consulting team. Apply your knowledge of best practice modelling techniques, technical and qualitative skills to assess investment decision making. Motivate optimal asset allocations, and asset manager combinations across a range of portfolios. Opportunity to work closely with investment consultants and analysts to improve decision-making and impose quantitative and qualitative rigour on investment process.

Key Responsibilities

• Drive the evolution of a robust quantitative and qualitative capability.
• Ensure investment decision making subject to quantitative scrutiny by attributing key decisions using both internal and external models.
• Engage with asset managers to provide solutions in portfolios.
• Improve consistency of manager combinations in solutions by applying advanced statistical techniques to portfolio construction.
• Apply statistical techniques to identify persistencies and consistencies of solutions.
• Drive the asset allocation framework including SAA and tactical bands, and consideration of new asset classes and investment strategies.
• Maintenance of and enhancements to quantitative tools, databases, systems and methodologies to stress test and improve manager selection, asset allocation and portfolio construction.
• Development and enhancements to the Quants framework to effectively deal with strategic initiatives within the team and the broader business.
• Actively participate in team discussions and investment decision making, bringing quantitative rigor and challenging qualitative views and biases.
• ESG knowledge and experience:
• Assess managers ESG policies and process.
• Understand ESG risks within portfolios.
• Monitor past investments from an ESG perspective in order to ensure that the primary fundamentals have not changed.
• Build ESG framework for Consulting purposes.
• Develop ESG scorecards, ratings and rankings for companies based on qualitative and quantitative analysis.
• Possess the ability to objectively view investment opportunities from a sustainable, moral and transparent perspective. Evaluate company performance against ESG criteria, including climate change, human rights, labour practices, diversity, corporate governance and sustainability reporting.
• Self-development.
• Ensure that standard procedures, practices and client servicing are maintained and adhered to.
• Risk awareness and the management of these risks.
• Awareness of regulatory legislation and developments within the industry.

Qualification and Experience

• Relevant bachelor's degree – bachelor’s degree majoring in Finance, Economics or Actuarial Science (Hons). Stats/Math’s Degree.
• CFA advantageous.
• Minimum of 3-5 years Asset Management/Investment experience.
• Excellent quantitative and manager research skills that have been honed in an asset management/multi-management environment.
• Practical knowledge of optimization techniques and modelling. Background in any actuarial or statistical modelling.
• Previous working experience in a multi-manager or single manager environment.
• Skills in identifying underlying managers/strategies for portfolio construction to achieve robust outcomes.

Knowledge and Skills

• Knowledge of investment products/asset classes and wider Investment services industry and process.
• Computer literate with proficiency in Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerBI, Macros and PowerPoint).
• Intermediate/Advanced programming and modelling skills (R, Python).
• Systems knowledge and experience (Morningstar, MSCI Barra, Bloomberg, Iress).
• Self-starter.
• Excellent and strong writing and communication skills.

Core Competencies

• Cultivates Innovation: Creating new and better ways for the organisation to be successful.
• Client Focus: Building strong customer relationships and delivering customer-centric solutions.
• Drives Results: Consistently achieving results, even under tough circumstances.
• Collaborates: Building partnerships and working collaboratively with others to meet shared objectives.
• Resilience: Rebounding from setbacks and adversity when facing difficult situations.
• Organisational Savvy: Maneuvering comfortably through complex policy, process and people related organizational dynamics.
• Manages Complexity: Making sense of complex, high quantity and sometimes contradictory information to effectively solve problems.
• Drives Engagement: Creating a climate where people are motivated to do their best to help the organisation achieve its objectives.
• Business Insight: Applying knowledge of the business and marketplace to advance the organisation’s goals.
• Displays Care: Showing care and consideration to our clients that extends beyond professionalism.

Turnaround time

The shortlisting process will only start once the application due date has been reached. The time taken to complete this process will depend on how far you progress and the availability of managers.

Our commitment to transformation

The Sanlam Group is committed to achieving transformation and embraces diversity. This commitment is what drives us to achieve a diverse, inclusive and equitable workplace as we believe that these are key components to ensuring a thriving and sustainable business in South Africa. The Group's Employment Equity plan and targets will be considered as part of the selection process. #J-18808-Ljbffr