Adam Jonas Analyst Performance

Cars—whether in the background or foreground—have always figured in the life of Adam Jonas. He grew up in Canton, Ohio (where roller bearings and steel are made), then headed even closer to the Motor City as a student at the University of Michigan, where he earned his Bachelor’s degree in business administration. After graduation, he landed an investment banking position at Dean Witter in Chicago, covering industrials and…the auto industry. But it wasn’t until Dean Witter merged with Morgan Stanley and he was added to the voicemail distribution list of Wall Street legend Stephen Girsky that cars became his calling. “He was the number one auto analyst for 16 years in a row,” Jonas says. “The first time I heard his voicemail, I said, ‘I have to do this.’ And I wanted international experience.” Jonas took a position as a researcher at a competitor in Europe, then returned to Morgan Stanley in 1999, en route to becoming its Lead European Auto Analyst, eventually returning to New York to run the firm’s global auto research team. Today, Jonas is a Managing Director who leads Global Auto & Shared Mobility Research, covering the auto industry and leading the firm’s cross-sector efforts on the space industry from his office in Times Square, where the hubcaps that hang over his desk remind him of both where he came from and what’s still left to discover on the road ahead. Read more about Jonas in the following interview.