What is it like being a trader?
I'm a junior still in undergrad (top 10 USNews despite not being a typical CS target) and am pondering trying my hand at quant/trader interviews. So I wanted to ask, what is it like being a quant or trader at firms like Citadel, HRT, Jump...etc? Is it high pressure and how are the hours like? I trade stocks in my own time and I think this would be a field I'd be potentially interested in. Thanks in advance
Working as eng supporting trader is bad imo. U basically are a script kiddie for traders, they come and tell u one off strategy and u just implement what he asks. If u wanna be trader u can do masters in financial engineering
It's high pressure, but not in a bad way. The pressure is merely to produce results - very little politics, ass-kissing etc. The hours are self-determined. Most people work 50ish. Some work 60. Source - was a quant trader at Citadel (quant traders are called quant researchers at Citadel)
Ate you a data scientist now? How was the TC change?
Yeah Quant research jobs > quant swe support jobs. Btw why did you leave?
lots of yelling and eating lunch at your desk.
You get lunch?!
Making tons of money it's great
Is it higher than FANG?
Significantly higher
I know CS and Math guys from TOP schools who are traders. If you don't get in as a trader don't bother. U need a PhD or MFE to be a quant otherwise u will be their lacky. Trader life sucks come early no lunch but leave early. My traders only took 2wks a year vacation since u have a book u need to watch or get 0 bonus if you aren't making $$. Huge bonus for the 20% of successful traders and fired otherwise. But heydey of trading careers is somewhat past...
For everyone saying “If you don’t get in as a trader, don’t bother”... it doesn’t work that way. Nobody in this world is going to hand over their money or client money to a fresh grad. You start as a “junior” or “algo analyst” (just read both as trading assistant)... get to know how to read market and write strategy enough for the desk to recognize you. Prove some alphas with trader backing your analysis skills and find the opportunity to step up. People who can’t step up soon retire to just being front-end to backend analysts or be risk managers...
Well that was the case. There's less and less trading in general. A lot is automated, margins have been squeezed. Your more successful in sales or being a broker. I personally don't think it's worth it. Its kind of like trying to make it big at pro sports. Your chances are very low
Yeah most are all “algo trader” and you make more money in the tech nowadays. The big ones... well they are a tough thing to become and no standard path towards it.
You're not going to be a trader. You're going to be a SWE supporting a trader, expect big pay, potentially long hours, using pre-existing tech to get the job done. It's not exactly glamorous, but it pays well. If you're a CS major this is probably what you'll do. You can probably switch to quant/trader after understanding the business. My suggestion is to work at a couple of big tech companies first then move to fintech/hedge funds, that way you will command respect and make big bucks. I can tell you this from experience having interviewed for these places and rejecting them.
I'm thinking about prepping and interviewing for trading positions and not SWE positions (for the trading companies); although I do think working a couple years in tech then swapping over to finance would be a good move as well.