This content was created by Bridger Pennington. This content was uploaded by Bridger Pennington. This is a YouTube video titled "Why I Quit My Job in Finance to Start Funds" (posted 2023-01-18). It is a first-person monologue in which a single speaker recounts leaving a 6-figure corporate finance job offer in Silicon Valley to pursue entrepreneurship, describing past college businesses, starting micro funds, launching a company (Funnel/Fund Launch) that grew to about $16M in sales, raising over $10M for a hedge fund, and helping others start student funds. The speaker references family reactions and his wife in the decision-making process and ends with a call-to-action to click links, like, and subscribe.
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This is actually the story of why I quit my 6-figure job in finance. I got stock options, a lot of cool stuff to go and be an entrepreneur and actually launch a fund. So let me take you back to 2018. I was a young hustling entrepreneur. I started 6 different businesses in college. I started a Chinese tutoring business. I did— I wholesaled 2 houses. I was doing everything that I could to make money in college, and I was doing internships at the same time. And this is where everything changed for me. Actually, my dad told me to go meet with his business partner. I went and met with this dude. I drove to his beautiful, gorgeous house. I came in, I sat on his couch, and he started to explain to me about investment funds, how funds work, how private equity or hedge funds or venture capital was put together. And I was so intrigued. At the time, they were managing over $8 billion of real estate. At that time, I decided I was going to start a fund. I don't know how long it was going to take me, 5 years, 10 years, or 30 years. I want— but I wanted to be in the world of funds running and scaling my own investment fund. Let me take you back to 2019. I was in Silicon Valley at an incredible huge company doing corporate finance, my dream job. This is where I wanted to be. Now as an intern, they work you like crazy to the bone. At the end of the summer, your goal is that you'll get a job offer to come work with them once you graduate. So I worked my little tail off, end of the summer comes, I got a huge job offer, 6-figure bonuses, everything. They were gonna transport me out to Silicon Valley to move there and live there, and it was a pretty cool offer. Now funny enough, you guys know my stories, 2 years leading up to that I'd started a bunch of businesses. I started 6 different companies inside it in college. I did— I wholesaled 2 houses. I had a Chinese tutoring business. We did a forex trading thing. I had an online marketing type of business. I was trying every business on YouTube under the sun I could think of. I was trying. And actually, through my dad and a few family friends, I started to learn about investment funds and how funds worked, how they were put together. And actually, in college, I started this little micro fund. I raised $49,000, started this little thing, and I raised some money, was making a little bit of money inside of this fund. But again, all the experts told me, no, you need to go to Wall Street. You need to work for 2 years, get your MBA, work on Wall Street for 20 years, and then and only then you could launch and run your own successful hedge fund or private equity fund or real estate fund. So again, I took their advice. I was in the finance route. I got the job offer. I'm sitting there, I'm looking at the paper, 6-figure sign. We're going to move you out to California. It'll be amazing. But funny enough, I'm looking at this job offer and I thought back to my boss in Silicon Valley that I worked for. Incredible dude. Great guy. He'd worked there for 12 years and worked himself to the bone. I mean, he was working 70 hours a week every week for 12 years, and I guessed he was making anywhere from maybe $800,000 to $1 million a year, which is fantastic money, don't get me wrong. But funny enough, in college I was already making well over 6 figures with my other businesses, and I was just getting started. So maybe it was dumb luck or whatever. And I thought, man, if I spent a decade with this company building and scaling, that's where I would end up. Or if I spent a decade working on my own businesses and my own funds, where would I be there? Could I beat my boss to that same benchmark of, let's call it, $800,000 a year? And I really remember weighing these two out. And I love the quote, people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in a decade. And the time I was newly married, we knelt down, me and my wife prayed about it, and we both felt like I should turn down the job offer and try to go after these entrepreneurial pursuits that I was thinking about, which was crazy. And you can imagine how my in-laws took that, my parents, my siblings, and everybody else around me took that decision once I did all this work to not go after the job offer and everything I got to go out to California. But for whatever reason, I felt like it was the right choice. And I said, okay, let's do this. And actually, crazy enough, 2 months later, we launched Funnel Launch, this company right here. That company's gone from $0 to $16 million in sales in about 2 and a half years. I ran my second fund and actually just exited that fund and then launched a third fund. We just raised over $10 million for our hedge fund. And actually 3 years later, I had already beat my boss's income in one single year. Now I'm still on the journey. I'm still on the road. We're still building these companies like crazy. But it was cool to see the differences of those. Now put the money aside, put all the cool stuff aside. If you think about your trajectory and what you're learning, a lot of people choose careers on what, based on what they're gonna learn or the experiences they're gonna have. Looking at my colleagues that stayed in the investment banking route or did consulting on Wall Street, I feel like I am learning way more than them right now managing 50 employees and 2 multi-eight-figure companies. And so the learning curve is like this, and also with that comes making money and all sorts of other cool stuff with it. So if there's anybody out there watching this that's considering investment banking or consulting or a career in finance because they wanna run a fund one day, do what's best for you, but I'm living proof that you don't have to go 20 years on Wall Street, to go to Harvard or Stanford or Wharton to be able to launch your own investment fund. Regular people like me and you are doing this every single day, and it's freaking insane. That's why we actually started this company, Fund Launch, is to help more and more people do this. We actually have one student fund over $1 billion, 4 student funds between $150 and $150 million, and 54 student funds between $1 and $50 million. So again, if you wanna learn how to do that, click on the links below. If you guys like this video, click like and subscribe, and I will see you guys in the next video. Bye. Bye.
