Going into finance after physics PhD

[EL]

I have seriously started considering going for a career in finance (as a "quant") after finishing my PhD in physics (theoretical astro/particle physics).

Anyone who knows what the prospects for getting good jobs in finance (Europe or US) as a physics PhD looks like today? After the "rocket scientist" boom on wall street starting something like a decade ago or so, what is the situation now? Are physicists still as sought-after?

What kind of merits are typically important in the eyes of the employers? How much knowledge in pure economics is typically required? What kind of physics knowledge is required/preferred?

Of course my above questions are very general, and I cannot expect anything but very general answers, but my hope is that someone can give some advice out of their own experience.

 

[arunma]

What do you know? I'm doing my PhD in experimental astroparticle physics. Anyway I'll be watching this thread closely. Never hurts to have as man employment options as possible.

 

[leon1127]

They still hire physics PhD. However it is important that you have knowledge of probability (stochastics analysis, martingales, etc) and PDEs. Also it is preferable if you know C++ and other languages. The books by streve is a very good indication of what technical skill you would need for quant.

 

[zhentil]

Surprisingly, they also look closely at your area of research. From what I've read over at wilmott.com, statistical mechanics/fluid dynamics/brownian motion is highly sought after because of the similarities to the stock market.

 

[EL]

They still hire physics PhD. However it is important that you have knowledge of probability (stochastics analysis, martingales, etc) and PDEs. Also it is preferable if you know C++ and other languages. The books by streve is a very good indication of what technical skill you would need for quant.

Good to here. Do you have personal experience from finance?
Could you (or anyone else) please provide a link to these relevant books by Streve?

If someone has more suggestions of quant litterature suitable for physicists, please let me know!

 

[EL]

Surprisingly, they also look closely at your area of research. From what I've read over at wilmott.com, statistical mechanics/fluid dynamics/brownian motion is highly sought after because of the similarities to the stock market.

Nice! Looks like an interesting website.

 

[EL]

What do you know?

At the moment, not very much at all...but I have almost two years to do some reading before I'll finish my PhD!

At first I just started to think of this option simply because of the bad employment situation in the research community: it's hard to get a top, or even decent, position anywhere (and probably it will get even harder now that both US and UK are cutting down the fundings severely), and even if you do, the position is often limited in time and the sallary basically sux. On the other hand I love to do physics research, but I won't do it for whatever price. Now that I have started to look more into finance I have actually noticed I find it very interesting. There seems to be a huge amount of untouched data to analyse (e.g. from the stock markets).

 

[George Jones]

Matthew Nobes went from a posdoc at Cornell to life as a quant,

http://latticeqcd.blogspot.com/2006/02/interview-with-matthew-nobes.html.

 

[leon1127]

Good to here. Do you have personal experience from finance?
Could you (or anyone else) please provide a link to these relevant books by Streve?

If someone has more suggestions of quant litterature suitable for physicists, please let me know!

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0387401016/?tag=pfamazon01-20

I am actually in some computational finance programme near NY. I believe that the employment of master student in this kind of programme will be bad in next one-two years. It is because many universities are developing such programmes while there aren't as many positions for master student. For example, my university's programme triple the size from last year. PhD is not restricted to this trend because there aren't as many PhD around as Masters.

 

[EL]

http://latticeqcd.blogspot.com/2006/02/interview-with-matthew-nobes.html" went from a posdoc at Cornell to life as a quant.

Interesting. Thanks.

 

[EL]

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0387401016/?tag=pfamazon01-20

What about Stochastic-Calculus-Finance-I? Do I need to read that before nr II?

 

[zhentil]

What about Stochastic-Calculus-Finance-I? Do I need to read that before nr II?

Of course. One of my friends was actually accepted into the CMU program that Shreve directs. He is certainly the best-known quant finance professor in the US. Another book to check out would be Arbitrage Theory in Continuous Time, and any number of fantastic books on stochastic differential equations.

 

[EL]

Thanks for the suggested litterature. Do you have any idea of what math and economics knowledge is required to read Shreves books?

Everyone, please feel free to inform me about appropriate litterature!

 

[leon1127]

Thanks for the suggested litterature. Do you have any idea of what math and economics knowledge is required to read Shreves books?

Everyone, please feel free to inform me about appropriate litterature!

They should be in your library. One is discrete time which is less relevant for your situation. Continuous time is the case when all the important probability comes into the play. You need to know calculus and probability really. No economics is required.

YOU DONT need to read 1 before reading 2. I even suggest reading 2 directly right after knowing discrete time martingale.