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hatelove
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To be a Derivatives Quant, Stats quant, etc.
Ah, I had no idea. I thought they mainly worked with finance, and the programming was minimal.twofish-quant said:90% of the people in finance with "quant" in their title are high end computer programmers. About 60% of the people I work with have Ph.d.'s and the other 40% have masters in some technical field with a lot of work experience before they got hired in finance.
So a Physics PhD would not be versatile at all in case of financial emergency (if, God forbid, a terrible calamity occurred with the economy in which a particular degree might be rendered null or something)?twofish-quant said:Also if your main interest is finance or to make money, do *NOT* get a Ph.D. in physics. It's silly to get a Ph.D. in physics if your main interest is either to work in finance or make money, for many reasons, not the least of which is that no one has a clue what the world financial situation will look like in five years.
hatelove said:Ah, I had no idea. I thought they mainly worked with finance, and the programming was minimal.
I read this blog entry: http://getonthedesk.blogspot.com/2008/01/day-in-life-of-quant.html
And I don't know how accurate it is, but it seemed like the programming was consisted of short coding periods (I can write up small programs [which might even be just considered scripts] too, though I wasn't aware how heavily programming was integrated in these types of careers).
So a Physics PhD would not be versatile at all in case of financial emergency (if, God forbid, a terrible calamity occurred with the economy in which a particular degree might be rendered null or something)?
Can you suggest more suitable degrees aside from, say, a Physics undergrad + Physics PhD?
hatelove said:Their resumes seem padded, but they also look very related and impressive, not to mention all the other hot shots that will be graduating from other top schools...
RugbyEng said:There are a ton of MFE programs out now. Maybe two-fish can comment on weight of a MFE from NYU or Columbia vs NCstate or Kent. In the early days a lot of PhD's would be hired because the field was blossoming and academic positions for physicist were becoming more rare post wartime. I believe the entry level quant positions are programming dominant, mainly in c++ and matlab, if I'm not mistaken. I also feel like the main goal of the entry level quant is to eventually obtain a position as a trader (where the real money lies). From what I've read most people in finance burn out within 5 years, so you need to decide if it is something you are really interested in.
I think I read that a lot of people who start as "quants" never really make it "big," and are really just coders.
So does this naturally bring the focus back to something like a computer engineering degree, as opposed to something like a degree in physics? Which would actually be more preferred in your line of work?twofish-quant said:Most of the hiring that I've seen has been in risk management and infrastructure programming.
This is actually what I'd like to concentrate on more. I'm by no means the most natural of abilities when it comes to problem solving, but I'd like to learn and improve my breadth of knowledge by expanding my vision to see outside of the box. Again, speaking of versatility, I thought maybe physics would help me achieve this as well as being able to land me a decent job where I can put my learned theories into practice.twofish-quant said:On the other hand, if the world economy collapses, than no degree is going to help you. Then again, being smart and curious can help you in extreme events.
RugbyEng said:Personally, if I was going to try and be a quant, I would pick my favorite engineering and pursue a BS (just not civil), maybe minor in math or cmsc at the same time. Work your tail off and get over a 3.5, graduate, get over a 750 on the math portion of the GRE, and hope to get into one of those Ivy league MFE programs.
This is actually what I was most likely considering...I wanted to take MSE @ NC State and then work on my PhD, but it seems getting an MFE first would be more sound going into the finance sector. If I can finish an MFE within a year, maybe I can still continue my PhD education afterwards?RugbyEng said:Now, the benefit of the engineering BS, if the financial world tanks again, you can get an engineering job.
Thanks, I've checked out that site and it would seem it's pretty helpful. Also makes me feel like the market is pretty saturated, but I'm going to go for it anyway.RugbyEng said:http://www.quantnet.com/ this website has a lot of information, and if you're really interested you can pick up Emanuel Derman's "My Life as a Quant."
RugbyEng said:There are a ton of MFE programs out now. Maybe two-fish can comment on weight of a MFE from NYU or Columbia vs NCstate or Kent.
In the early days a lot of PhD's would be hired because the field was blossoming and academic positions for physicist were becoming more rare post wartime. I believe the entry level quant positions are programming dominant, mainly in c++ and matlab
if I'm not mistaken. I also feel like the main goal of the entry level quant is to eventually obtain a position as a trader (where the real money lies).
From what I've read most people in finance burn out within 5 years, so you need to decide if it is something you are really interested in.
I think I read that a lot of people who start as "quants" never really make it "big," and are really just coders.
hatelove said:So does this naturally bring the focus back to something like a computer engineering degree, as opposed to something like a degree in physics? Which would actually be more preferred in your line of work?
Maybe going into the field of mathematics might perform similarly? Though I'm not sure how viable that would be in comparison to physics or engineering...
RugbyEng said:Personally, if I was going to try and be a quant, I would pick my favorite engineering and pursue a BS (just not civil), maybe minor in math or cmsc at the same time. Work your tail off and get over a 3.5, graduate, get over a 750 on the math portion of the GRE, and hope to get into one of those Ivy league MFE programs.
Here are Cal Berkley's prereq's
http://www.quantnet.com/ this website has a lot of information, and if you're really interested you can pick up Emanuel Derman's "My Life as a Quant."
hatelove said:This is actually what I was most likely considering...I wanted to take MSE @ NC State and then work on my PhD, but it seems getting an MFE first would be more sound going into the finance sector. If I can finish an MFE within a year, maybe I can still continue my PhD education afterwards?
Thanks, I've checked out that site and it would seem it's pretty helpful. Also makes me feel like the market is pretty saturated, but I'm going to go for it anyway.
hatelove said:Are there any specific texts that you'd personally suggest?
hatelove said:I was looking for something cross between applied mathematics and statistics, and I've recently discovered something called "actuarial science..." This might be the best option I've found so far because I wanted to go into something like applied statistics (which I don't think exists) and actuarial science seems pretty close.
I was actually warned by several other people that any degree (especially a PhD) which is too "general" might not be such a good idea, and that I should specialize in a certain field. Does this apply to statistics as well, or will a general statistics degree be fine on the market?chiro said:Statistics is one of the most applied fields out there. It's almost an oxymoron to have statistics not be an applied fields (and yes I am aware of theoretical results in statistics and associated research).
If you want to do any kind of "applied" statistics, just major in it and do some post-graduate work in it along with as many projects as you can. Actuarial work is statistics applied to risk management, but there are other applications of statistics which include to the sciences (including the area of health) as well as other things like business and government.
hatelove said:I was actually warned by several other people that any degree (especially a PhD) which is too "general" might not be such a good idea, and that I should specialize in a certain field. Does this apply to statistics as well, or will a general statistics degree be fine on the market?
npc said:I have always been facinated by the number of people who seem to want do physics to become 'quants'. Everyone should realize that 'quant' work is not physics and never will be, so don't do physics just because you want to become a quant.
The attraction is the money, but this is not going to last much longer.
Future job prospects are also not great, certainly, across europe now most organisations are deleveraging, getting rid of the complicated stuff and going more 'vanilla', the result of this will be less need for high end quant people.
Mind you, the quant who comes up with a derivative that avoids the proposed eurpoean financial transaction levy will have a secure job...
Kevlarji said:I say no, I've been to numerous bulge bracket bank campus visits and have asked them this question. "Do I require a PhD to get into Quant?" the response majority of responses I've had is no you can get into an analyst position but if you make it clear you are very interested in quant finance you can leverage yourself into a quant role without having a PhD and getting in the general way.
Well, if you're living proof that your degree isn't unemployable, then I don't feel so worried after all.twofish-quant said:2) Now once I got my Ph.D., I found is was extremely useful. For me "general" is good, because my career has involved moving from field to field looking for where ever the grass is greenest. The problem with specializing in a specific field is that you are totally hosed if everyone else decides to do the same thing.
My guess is that ten years from now, I won't be doing finance. Even if everything works great, I'll get bored and want to do something else.
hatelove said:I was actually warned by several other people that any degree (especially a PhD) which is too "general" might not be such a good idea, and that I should specialize in a certain field. Does this apply to statistics as well, or will a general statistics degree be fine on the market?
Poopsilon said:Twofish-quant, you give a lot of contrarian advice about becoming a quant, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but is not exactly actionable.
Thus maybe you could talk about what someone with a masters in math and a strong foundation in statistics, analysis, probability, and programming can do to further develop his or her skill set in order to make themselves competitive for those math heavy positions, (note I won't use the word quant since you say you don't know what that word means).
Will it be just to continue to master increasingly sophisticated areas of math which have been historically associated with quantitative finance?
I don't think anyone wants to waste time learning material which will be useless in a few years when they apply.
I understand that when you have the job then part of it will be continuously learning new material as the industry evolves. But for those who don't have the job yet, how can we develop ourselves to stand out without spending 60k on an MFE or 5 years getting a phd?