Quantitative Investment Strategies, Vice President, Institutional Equity Division

Company Profile

Morgan Stanley is a leading global financial services firm providing a wide range of investment banking, securities, investment management and wealth management services. The Firm's employees serve clients worldwide including corporations, governments and individuals from more than 1,200 offices in 43 countries.

As a market leader, the talent and passion of our people is critical to our success. Together, we share a common set of values rooted in integrity, excellence and strong team ethic. Morgan Stanley can provide a superior foundation for building a professional career - a place for people to learn, to achieve and grow. A philosophy that balances personal lifestyles, perspectives and needs is an important part of our culture.

Department Profile

From global institutions to hedge funds, investors come to Morgan Stanley for sales, trading, and market-making services in almost every type of financial instrument in all the world’s financial markets. Morgan Stanley professionals use our network and technology to provide liquidity and sophisticated analysis, to manage risk and execute reliably in the fast-changing markets.

Morgan Stanley’s Institutional Equity Division (IED) is a world leader in the origination, distribution and trading of equity, equity-linked and equity-derivative securities. Our broad and deep client relationships, market-leading platform and intellectual insights enable us to be a world-class service provider to our clients for their financing, market access and portfolio management needs.

Global Markets Group is the offshoring arm of Morgan Stanley’s Sales & Trading businesses in India. It covers functions across IED ranging from those associated with sales, trading, analytics, strats to risk management.

Primary Responsibilities

The Quantitative Investment Strategies business at Morgan Stanley sits within the Institutional Securities Group with a cross-asset mandate and is a global multi-function team consisting of dedicated Research, Structuring, Strats, and Trading. The mandate of the group is to design quantitative systematic strategies that can be offered to the firm’s clients to access in a variety of formats.

This is a challenging role and offering exposure to an interesting, dynamic product group and work environment to build your career in.

Responsibilities For This Role Would Involve

• Implement and back test performance of Morgan Stanley QIS indices.
• Research & Development of new strategies based on factors like beta, risk-premia, volatility, momentum, and launching the same for trade.
• Daily maintenance and publication of Morgan Stanley indices, involving data quality and implementation checks.
• Debug existing indices to fix evolution issues and provide intermediary results for comparison vs. production code.
• Work closely with Financial Engineers and trading teams on the back testing and replication of QIS indices in Morgan Stanley risk systems.
• Minor modifications to existing live indices – e.g. new cost structures, universe changes, minor methodology adjustments.
• Carrying out performance attribution of systematic strategies.
• Production of periodic standard performance reporting for client distribution.
• Development and production of positions, stress, composition reports for clients.
• Bespoke scenario/sensitivity analysis for clients.

Leadership, Stakeholder & Team Management

• Lead, groom, and develop the QIS Structuring team in Mumbai.
• Foster a culture of collaboration and efficiency, ensuring that the team provides top-tier support to the desk.
• Monitor team performance and feedback, handle resource planning, recruitment, and staff training.
• Build strong relationships with Trading desks, Risk, Compliance, and Technology teams.
• Serve as a liaison between the Global Structuring, Sales & Trading desk and other departments to resolve issues and implement solutions.
• Regularly report on key metrics and performance to senior management.
• Strategize to expand the Mumbai footprint.

Skills Required (essential)

• Degree with a quantitative discipline (BE, BTech, MS in Maths/Statistics/Financial Engineering) from Tier 1 institutes.
• 7-10 year of prior exposure to Index/Quants Research and equities/multi asset indices analytics is important.
• 5+ years of relevant working experience in a QIS role using Python and Java or C++. KDB database knowledge is a plus.
• Must be able to flexibly respond to changes in priorities, be able to communicate results to a less-technical audience, work well in a team and be comfortable in a front office environment.
• Strong attention to detail.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills/Ability to express ideas via writing. Prior track record in writing marketing material/trade ideas for wider distribution will be advantageous.
• Proactiveness / Initiative taking & Teamwork are the skills desired.

In addition, the candidate should have theoretical or practical understanding of:

• Option Greeks and their behavior over time.
• Derivative products like Swaps, Swaptions, Spread Options, Cap/Floors, range accruals, Digitals etc.
• General behavior of Equity Derivatives markets – Flow and Structured Products.

What You Can Expect From Morgan Stanley

At Morgan Stanley, we raise, manage and allocate capital for our clients – helping them reach their goals. We do it in a way that’s differentiated – and we’ve done that for 90 years. Our values - putting clients first, doing the right thing, leading with exceptional ideas, committing to diversity and inclusion, and giving back - aren’t just beliefs, they guide the decisions we make every day to do what's best for our clients, communities and more than 80,000 employees in 1,200 offices across 42 countries. At Morgan Stanley, you’ll find an opportunity to work alongside the best and the brightest, in an environment where you are supported and empowered. Our teams are relentless collaborators and creative thinkers, fueled by their diverse backgrounds and experiences. We are proud to support our employees and their families at every point along their work-life journey, offering some of the most attractive and comprehensive employee benefits and perks in the industry. There’s also ample opportunity to move about the business for those who show passion and grit in their work.

Morgan Stanley is an equal opportunity employer committed to building and maintaining a workforce that is diverse in experience and background. Our recruiting efforts reflect our strong commitment to a culture of inclusion, where individuals are hired, developed, and advanced based on their skills and talents.

Our workforce reflects a broad cross-section of the global communities in which we operate, bringing a variety of backgrounds, talents, perspectives, and experiences.

Key skills/competency

• Quantitative Investment Strategies
• Vice President
• Institutional Equity Division
• Financial Engineering
• Python
• Java
• C++
• KDB
• Derivatives
• Equity Markets