(Bloomberg View) -- Matthew Kadnar, this week's guest on Masters in Business, had a good career going as a lawyer. He was a senior associate at Melick & Porter, and then became in-house counsel for LPL Financial Services. But Kadnar was intrigued by the market, and made the big transition from being an attorney to asset management.
Megaphone.fm: Matthew Kadnar Talks About His Transition From Law to Finance by Masters in Business
He found the markers both more interesting and more challenging, eventually becoming a Certified Financial Analyst. After stints at Putnam Investments, in 2004 he joined Grantham, Mayo & Van Otterloo, where he is now a member of the firm's asset-allocation team.
In our conversation, Kadnar discusses the challenges of active management, noting that “only people who love it should be participating as portfolio managers.” Despite the appearance of being “quite glamorous,” at times, it can be “humbling and soul-crushing.” Managers who underperform find it a miserable existence. But to those who love it, and can persevere despite the challenges, it is a joy.
Kadnar also describes some of the more unusual strategies GMO, which has more than $70 billion under management, has developed over the years.
His favorite books are cited here; our conversation transcript is available here.
You can stream/download the full conversation, including the podcast extras, on iTunes, Bloomberg and Overcast. Our earlier podcasts can all be found on iTunes, Overcast and Bloomberg.
Next week, we chat with Annie Duke, who won the World Series of Poker in 2004, and at one point was the winningest female poker player in history. She is the author of “Thinking in Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When You Don't Have All the Facts.”
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.
Barry Ritholtz is a Bloomberg View columnist. He founded Ritholtz Wealth Management and was chief executive and director of equity research at FusionIQ, a quantitative research firm. He blogs at the Big Picture and is the author of “Bailout Nation: How Greed and Easy Money Corrupted Wall Street and Shook the World Economy.”
To contact the editor responsible for this story: James Greiff at jgreiff@bloomberg.net.
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