Serious question, can you point to anyone who has been hired by a $50M plus fund based on a "track record" in a personal account? It would be great if it worked this way, but in reality it just doesn't. You get hired based on who you know, your degree, and at the higher levels how much you've paid your dues as an analyst/associate. There are perhaps a very few exceptions, but they are vanishingly few. Love to see evidence to the contrary?
Do I need a PhD in a quantitative field to get a job in algorithmic trading?
- Thread starter nightmarish
- Start date
No,I do not know
I gave you my point of view,you are free to think otherwise,i used to ,but don't come here to argue anymore.I have different clashes to fight
After giving it a second thought if general hiring guidelines are as you describe them so be it.Why,because looking from point of view of anyone in possession of such strategy they would waste time going to any fund,better do it on their own.This evolution happens as one's confidence grows,this leads me to believe that such cases are rare and i fully agree with you that these examples are hard to find.
I am in Budapest,there is no HFs here besides Morgan Stanley having their coding outsourced.
I was hired strictly on the results of a live trading test, by the largest options trader in the world at the time. He wanted someone who could day trade the SP futures. For months I called trades in until I figured I was getting anywhere so I stopped. That's when they offered me a opportunity, and I took it. m
So no finance background or finance related degree? Would love to hear the back story on how you set that up, sounds like it would be a good read!
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lovethetrade
The established financial institutions have a certain protocol they follow, i.e. promote from within or outsource with specific filtering criteria to recruitment firms. They are more interested in investing long-term in the people they hire with the expectation it will be reciprocated.
The boutique algorithmic/HFT trading firms (e.g Tibra/Optiver) on the other hand, are more likely to hire you based only on back/forward test results and programming skills but still probably require at least a degree. These type of firms are interested in your ability to create a pipeline of new trading strategies that can end up being worth significantly more than what they pay you. They have a higher turnover rate and your ability to survive with depend largely on your ability to create new ideas and value add.
The boutique algorithmic/HFT trading firms (e.g Tibra/Optiver) on the other hand, are more likely to hire you based only on back/forward test results and programming skills but still probably require at least a degree. These type of firms are interested in your ability to create a pipeline of new trading strategies that can end up being worth significantly more than what they pay you. They have a higher turnover rate and your ability to survive with depend largely on your ability to create new ideas and value add.
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Why such a childish-sounding nickname?
In short.
I came out of the construction industry a HS dropout who performed job cost estimating on a Apple 3e business computer with VisaCalc in the 70's decades before most colleges offered computer classes. Taught myself to program Basic, C and Fortran by way of brute trial and error.
Hung around Dallas AFTA meetings and was offered small programming jobs and received many referrals. Dedicated to learn at all cost I took a small paying position that eventually (decades) educated me to where I could buy Lambo's and Jets. Yea it's pretty interesting by any comparison in this industry.
Cool story, thanks.
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lovethetrade
Nice one but big difference between the 70s/80s and 2017, that rarely happens these days due to the job market being so competitive with an oversupply of high-quality candidates that have either Masters or PhD level degrees and programming skills. Today, 99% of people have to follow standard process (i.e. go to uni, learn programming, get their foot in the door or apply for a graduate position) to have any chance at all. If you don't have the degree you usually have to go the do-it-yourself or startup path to fastrack your career.
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