Nawaz Sharif Every year, thousands of Pakistani University students who have majored in Finance, apply to a limited number of job openings. Although the un-employment rate in Pakistan has been stagnant at 5.8% for the past few years, many graduates end up working jobs, that are polar opposites of their major in University. For example, a Computer Science graduate might have taken up a role as a Sales Executive in a FMCG Company. Same is the case with Finance Majors, who have a hard time finding the right fit.

Let’s see what careers there are in the field of Finance:

• Financial Planner
• Financial Analyst
• Credit Analyst
• Hedge Fund Manager
• Mutual Fund Manager
• Data Analyst
• Actuary
• Financial Consultant

It is important to note that Pakistan has a hazy definition of Finance, which overlaps with Accountancy with disregard to the idea that they are principally two very different fields. In short, Accountancy deals with record keeping and laws that govern that record keeping, where as Finance deals with management of assets, forecasts and creation of wealth. Nonetheless, since Finance departments in Telecom companies like Mobilink have ACCAs and CAs in their Finance department, we shall assume accountancy in the domain of Finance. Here is a series of questions you should ask yourself if you are pursuing a career in Finance.

What is your educational background?

• CA
• ACCA
• CPA
• CMA
• CFA
• BS Applied Accounting
• Accounting & Finance Major
• Finance Major

Educational Background

Your educational background matters a lot. Why so? Chartered Accountants have higher technical expertise than ACCAs, and relevant knowledge pertaining to laws of Pakistan, whereas CPAs (Australia and US) have the right balance of management and industry and technical expertise. In-fact, in the US, employees with the MBA and CPA are much likely to end up as CFO of a corporation. In Pakistan, one might give that title to a MBA and CA. Accounting and Finance Majors have much less technical expertise than conventional CAs or ACCAs in the field of accounting, but a better acumen in financial forecasting, asset management and business management.

Salary

Salary depends on a variety of factors, such as work experience, the market value of the institution if one is a finance university graduate, and market value of accounting firm such as PwC, KPMG etc. But let’s gauge the entry level expected salary.

• CPAs – PKR 85 K- 100 K
• CAs – PKR 64 K – 80 K
• ACCAs – PKR 35 K – 60 K
• AcF Graduate (LUMS, IBA) – PKR 70 K – 90 K
• AcF Graduate (Other Universities) – PKR 25 K – 45 K
• CFAs – PKR 80 K -150 K. (Ranges indefinitely due to lack of organized funds in Pakistan)

Career Choices

CPAs, CAs and ACCAs have a very different career path than conventional finance university graduates. CFAs (Upto level 2) are more oriented towards gearing themselves for a mutual fund. With the amount of asset management companies raising to 20, and around 200 mutual funds, around which half of them are open ended, CFAs tend to land jobs in these funds. Many try to go to UAE to land positions in top notch private equity funds like The Al Abraaj group. Finance graduates from universities end up in management positions rather than very technical finance positions (involving GL codes etc).