Question for the city boys
Discussion
How did you get your job? Did you have previous work experience or have an internship and then offered a job / go through the graduate scheme / start off at the bottom of the ladder and work your way up / work in some other occupation previously and then move into it / take on some extra study such as masters/PhD then go from there or some alternative method?
As a recent graduate i've been applying to many investment banks for analyst positions ideally in trading. But so far i've been somewhat unsuccessful and i'm feeling that the graduate route won't be very fruitful to me as I can't compete with the LSE, Oxford / Cambridge graduates on their academic credentials alone (although I do have a 2.1 from a respected university in a "proper" degree I add). So this leads me to thinking that I should either do some more study such as a masters to make myself a more attractive candidate to the banks, or just apply for trade support positions and hope to move up the ladder. I've found even for trade support they want previous financial experience which I lack, but i've not explored this avenue in great depth yet.
So any suggestions, opinions and insight will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for any help
As a recent graduate i've been applying to many investment banks for analyst positions ideally in trading. But so far i've been somewhat unsuccessful and i'm feeling that the graduate route won't be very fruitful to me as I can't compete with the LSE, Oxford / Cambridge graduates on their academic credentials alone (although I do have a 2.1 from a respected university in a "proper" degree I add). So this leads me to thinking that I should either do some more study such as a masters to make myself a more attractive candidate to the banks, or just apply for trade support positions and hope to move up the ladder. I've found even for trade support they want previous financial experience which I lack, but i've not explored this avenue in great depth yet.
So any suggestions, opinions and insight will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for any help
g4ry13 said:
How did you get your job? Did you have previous work experience or have an internship and then offered a job / go through the graduate scheme / start off at the bottom of the ladder and work your way up / work in some other occupation previously and then move into it / take on some extra study such as masters/PhD then go from there or some alternative method?
As a recent graduate i've been applying to many investment banks for analyst positions ideally in trading. But so far i've been somewhat unsuccessful and i'm feeling that the graduate route won't be very fruitful to me as I can't compete with the LSE, Oxford / Cambridge graduates on their academic credentials alone (although I do have a 2.1 from a respected university in a "proper" degree I add). So this leads me to thinking that I should either do some more study such as a masters to make myself a more attractive candidate to the banks, or just apply for trade support positions and hope to move up the ladder. I've found even for trade support they want previous financial experience which I lack, but i've not explored this avenue in great depth yet.
So any suggestions, opinions and insight will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for any help
What about doing a year in settlements or something? LEarn what's involved and maybe take some training? There's got to be industry standard qualifications for stuff.As a recent graduate i've been applying to many investment banks for analyst positions ideally in trading. But so far i've been somewhat unsuccessful and i'm feeling that the graduate route won't be very fruitful to me as I can't compete with the LSE, Oxford / Cambridge graduates on their academic credentials alone (although I do have a 2.1 from a respected university in a "proper" degree I add). So this leads me to thinking that I should either do some more study such as a masters to make myself a more attractive candidate to the banks, or just apply for trade support positions and hope to move up the ladder. I've found even for trade support they want previous financial experience which I lack, but i've not explored this avenue in great depth yet.
So any suggestions, opinions and insight will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for any help
Do you care what you trade?
(Not employed in the City!)
I'm pretty open minded on it, so if settlements is a good path into a trading career i'd definitely consider it. As far as what i'd like to trade - i'm not too bothered. I have some preference on some things as I have some basic knowledge on it already, but either way i'm happy to learn and trade something i'm less "knowledgeable" about. The only thing I wouldn't like to trade is death futures.
I was head hunted from an oil major.
As for how others can get in to the sector - it really seems to depend what area of investment banking you're interested in. I'm in commodities and work for an investment bank in the front office. If you're struggling to enter the sector through a bank then how about trying another industry with trading opportunities? For instance most utility companies & oil majors have trading desks. I know from experience it is easy to trade the same commodity through them, than getting the same role but in an investment bank.
I have seen a few people move from back office to front office, so agree this could be a way to get in to the industry. But be careful. It's a sad fact that invisible walls often exist between some roles and others. I know of a couple of employers where there is nothing written down but noone in IT or trade support would ever be likely to move in to the front office. I don't necessarily agree with that. But it is how it is. If everyone in back office can label every trader as arrogant, then the sad fact is that everyone in front office can label back office as a bit dumb.
Out of interest what is your degree in ?
As for how others can get in to the sector - it really seems to depend what area of investment banking you're interested in. I'm in commodities and work for an investment bank in the front office. If you're struggling to enter the sector through a bank then how about trying another industry with trading opportunities? For instance most utility companies & oil majors have trading desks. I know from experience it is easy to trade the same commodity through them, than getting the same role but in an investment bank.
I have seen a few people move from back office to front office, so agree this could be a way to get in to the industry. But be careful. It's a sad fact that invisible walls often exist between some roles and others. I know of a couple of employers where there is nothing written down but noone in IT or trade support would ever be likely to move in to the front office. I don't necessarily agree with that. But it is how it is. If everyone in back office can label every trader as arrogant, then the sad fact is that everyone in front office can label back office as a bit dumb.
Out of interest what is your degree in ?
che6mw said:
Out of interest what is your degree in ?
It's in Economics and Management. I spoke with a friend tonight and he's thinking a Masters is the way forward for me. So are you saying if I end up doing something like trade support / settlements it's very possible my chances of becoming a trader are slim if they exist at all?
Edited by g4ry13 on Sunday 11th November 01:11
g4ry13 said:
che6mw said:
Out of interest what is your degree in ?
It's in Economics and Management. I spoke with a friend tonight and he's thinking a Masters is the way forward for me. So are you saying if I end up doing something like trade support / settlements it's very possible my chances of becoming a trader are slim if they exist at all?
Edited by g4ry13 on Sunday 11th November 01:11
g4ry13 said:
che6mw said:
Out of interest what is your degree in ?
It's in Economics and Management. I spoke with a friend tonight and he's thinking a Masters is the way forward for me. So are you saying if I end up doing something like trade support / settlements it's very possible my chances of becoming a trader are slim if they exist at all?
Edited by g4ry13 on Sunday 11th November 01:11
What were you thinking of doing your Masters degree in? The City likes things to do with Maths - again, not a set rule. But if I look around me the odds look to be in the favour of someone with a Maths based degree. It might be worth speaking to recruitment agencies who deal with City placements before signing up to a masters - they should know better than me and might feel a years experience in the City in a non-trading role would be more beneficial.
Good luck!
I read somewhere that it helps if you focus your interest as that means you really are interested in getting into the role you're applying for, rather than (for instance, not necessarily yourself), applying for any IB job that sounds like it'll pay a lot whether it's analyst or trader. I suppose that is pretty much the case for any career eg if you want a job in IT you don't apply to every IT support, IT admin, IT developer, IT sales job and not have a specific preferred interest; you learn about a specific system and how to manage it if you want to get into IT admin. (I know it is probably the case that you'd be happy in any analyst role but they probably want to see you're very committed.)
What kind of trading do you want to do? Even if you don't care about the product (p.s. wtf is a death future? If it's what it sounds like then it's probably one of the few products you can trade as a quant without risk of blowing up because of "20 sigma once in a lifetime events"
the differences between trading styles are immense. Packaging vanillas into exotics is very different to day trading, which differs from sales trading, which differs from arbitrage, etc etc. And some of these trading styles won't work with certain instruments - day trading stocks is a road to ruin, for example.
Anyway, here are some good books you should read, although you'll probably have read most of them:
Liar's Poker
When genius failed
A random walk across Wall Street
A non random walk across Wall Street
Beyond greed and fear
Irrational exuberance
Extraordinary popular delusions and the madness of crowds
The misbehaviour of markets (although the version currently on sale on Amazon has plenty of misprints in it, this is a very important book)
The Black Swan: The impact of the highly improbable.
Options, Futures and Derivatives (or something like that, it's by a guy called Hull)
Every single one of these is a riveting read (apart from Hull and beyond greed and feer), and more imporantly a lot of this stuff isn't touched upon in more conventional texts.
Anyway, you shouldn't have much trouble getting an interview at the (or even not very small) prop trading firms with those sorts of qualifications, I do have an oxbridge 2.1 (which, by the way, effectively only certifies that you've turned up for most of your exams on time and understood what you were taught, it isn't as impressive as some people think) but there are people trading without any gcses who have worked their way from the back office by the time they were 20. If you don't blow up after three years (and if you do, you don't lose any money other than what you could have had) then it's pretty easy to get a job in a hedge fund, but it's very hard to beat prop trading on a work/reward basis, and there's also the nobility of living or dying by your own sword, which rather appeals to me.
Your other alternative is to get any old job, save up twenty grand or so, which is probably the minimum you'd need to deposit to get any sort of reasonable limit, and then have a go in an arcarde of your choice. Obviously only do that if you're prepared to lose all your money, and for gods sake don't go selling naked options or similar - actually it's very easy to create various cunning strategies that will make you money 9 times out of 10, but unfortunately have negative expectancy. Hull will give you some ideas for doing that (don't do it!) - you can create any shape of payout between a certain range by adding together butterflies, for example. Shame if the price of the instrument leaves that range...
If any of the above advice is bo
ocks, I'm sure someone will correct me!
the differences between trading styles are immense. Packaging vanillas into exotics is very different to day trading, which differs from sales trading, which differs from arbitrage, etc etc. And some of these trading styles won't work with certain instruments - day trading stocks is a road to ruin, for example.Anyway, here are some good books you should read, although you'll probably have read most of them:
Liar's Poker
When genius failed
A random walk across Wall Street
A non random walk across Wall Street
Beyond greed and fear
Irrational exuberance
Extraordinary popular delusions and the madness of crowds
The misbehaviour of markets (although the version currently on sale on Amazon has plenty of misprints in it, this is a very important book)
The Black Swan: The impact of the highly improbable.
Options, Futures and Derivatives (or something like that, it's by a guy called Hull)
Every single one of these is a riveting read (apart from Hull and beyond greed and feer), and more imporantly a lot of this stuff isn't touched upon in more conventional texts.
Anyway, you shouldn't have much trouble getting an interview at the (or even not very small) prop trading firms with those sorts of qualifications, I do have an oxbridge 2.1 (which, by the way, effectively only certifies that you've turned up for most of your exams on time and understood what you were taught, it isn't as impressive as some people think) but there are people trading without any gcses who have worked their way from the back office by the time they were 20. If you don't blow up after three years (and if you do, you don't lose any money other than what you could have had) then it's pretty easy to get a job in a hedge fund, but it's very hard to beat prop trading on a work/reward basis, and there's also the nobility of living or dying by your own sword, which rather appeals to me.
Your other alternative is to get any old job, save up twenty grand or so, which is probably the minimum you'd need to deposit to get any sort of reasonable limit, and then have a go in an arcarde of your choice. Obviously only do that if you're prepared to lose all your money, and for gods sake don't go selling naked options or similar - actually it's very easy to create various cunning strategies that will make you money 9 times out of 10, but unfortunately have negative expectancy. Hull will give you some ideas for doing that (don't do it!) - you can create any shape of payout between a certain range by adding together butterflies, for example. Shame if the price of the instrument leaves that range...
If any of the above advice is bo
ocks, I'm sure someone will correct me!che6mw said:
What were you thinking of doing your Masters degree in? The City likes things to do with Maths - again, not a set rule. But if I look around me the odds look to be in the favour of someone with a Maths based degree. It might be worth speaking to recruitment agencies who deal with City placements before signing up to a masters - they should know better than me and might feel a years experience in the City in a non-trading role would be more beneficial.
I'd do it in something numerical like statistical methods or along those lines and i'd do it at a decent place like LSE. I wouldn't waste my time doing it an average place as I could only end up with the same problem again.You can read about death futures here. In short, the earlier people die the more money you make.
I've got "Liar's Poker" by my bed at the moment and just currently reading it. I'm sure i've looked at "options, futures and derivatives" when I was at university and read bits and pieces of it to see if I could take something out of it. Apart from that, I haven't covered much of the list that was mentioned.
I'm interested mainly in prop trading and i'd also consider arbitrage. If I took 20 grand to an arcade as you called it, why would I do that rather than just trade from home if the risk of losing it all remains the same?
Get a job in the back office or middle office, or even how about desk assistant? If you are good in the back office and chat up the right people, moving to the front office is not impossible.
If you can do the Registered Representative exam that will also show willing as well as teaching you the basics of pricing some options etc.
If you want to trade just because you think it will make you rich, bear in mind that plenty fail. AND lose money 3 months running and in plenty of firms kiss goodbye to your job. Can you handle stress very well indeed? You will need to.
If you can do the Registered Representative exam that will also show willing as well as teaching you the basics of pricing some options etc.
If you want to trade just because you think it will make you rich, bear in mind that plenty fail. AND lose money 3 months running and in plenty of firms kiss goodbye to your job. Can you handle stress very well indeed? You will need to.
g4ry13 said:
If I took 20 grand to an arcade as you called it, why would I do that rather than just trade from home if the risk of losing it all remains the same?
You'd benefit from economies of scale and pick up some interesting tricks from other traders. Plus there would be much less chance of technical problems. That said, there isn't a hugely compelling reason!"Trading" isn't the type of job many people walk straight into a la the Capital City TV programme of the late 1980s.
Graduate training programmes, Desk Assistants made good are the favourite two.
You can earn decent £ in the back offices too if you are good. Clerks with a years experience are on £25 an hour upwards, Project Managers easily see £100 an hour and we have a 24 year old consultant on £120 an hour
Graduate training programmes, Desk Assistants made good are the favourite two.
You can earn decent £ in the back offices too if you are good. Clerks with a years experience are on £25 an hour upwards, Project Managers easily see £100 an hour and we have a 24 year old consultant on £120 an hour
No salary, you just get 50+% of what you earn for the company, who provide some capital to begin with, training etc. If you don't earn, you don't eat. If you do earn, you get much more of what you have earned than a conventional salaried trader, and there's a lot more freedom about what and how you can trade. And if you blow up, you're not personally liable. The caveat, of course, is most don't make it, and those that do can probably make more money trading for an investment bank or hedge fund.
I would be very careful of the trading bucket shops, where punters get such a high payout % from an early stage, the reason being individual traders tend to look out for themselves an you are not neccesarily likely to learn too much.
Better to get on to a trading desk as an assistant or junior of some sort, it really is better to walk before you run...I started in the back office-desk assistant-junior trader-trader-then trading bank capital, trading whatever you want! Settlements or middle office is a good place to start and it is very useful for traders to understand the importance of these functions.
Many of the desks in banks are customer based franchises, which is often quite a world apart from prop/hedge fund trading.
Best to take opportunities as they come along, it may be easier to change direction to another form of trading once you have some CV experience rather than directly getting into what you think you want to do now (things change when you progress).
Better to get on to a trading desk as an assistant or junior of some sort, it really is better to walk before you run...I started in the back office-desk assistant-junior trader-trader-then trading bank capital, trading whatever you want! Settlements or middle office is a good place to start and it is very useful for traders to understand the importance of these functions.
Many of the desks in banks are customer based franchises, which is often quite a world apart from prop/hedge fund trading.
Best to take opportunities as they come along, it may be easier to change direction to another form of trading once you have some CV experience rather than directly getting into what you think you want to do now (things change when you progress).
Retard said:
No salary, you just get 50+% of what you earn for the company, who provide some capital to begin with, training etc. If you don't earn, you don't eat. If you do earn, you get much more of what you have earned than a conventional salaried trader, and there's a lot more freedom about what and how you can trade. And if you blow up, you're not personally liable. The caveat, of course, is most don't make it, and those that do can probably make more money trading for an investment bank or hedge fund.
Is this what you do for a living then?g4ry13 said:
Thanks for all the opinions so far. So experience vs Masters? Is there any conclusive opinions which is better for my current situation? It's looking like experience and working damn hard with a bit of luck seems to be the best route.
Another option is to do an evening course, such as the CQFhttp://www.7city.com/cqf.php?area=quants&outli...
I did it earlier this year - quite focused towards options.
For someone with a degree in Economics and Management and a stated interest in this, you don't seem to know that much about "trading". "Trading" covers quite a range of roles, everything from the "Shouty prat in stripy suit" for which you may already be over-qualified, to the (normally) more reserved serious mathematics geniuses who would generally be qualified in, oddly, maths.
Want to narrow it down a little?
That aside:
o the first City job is the hardest to get; seriously try for the graduate schemes
o you can change roles, but it isn't simple; an unrelated job is 'no experience'
o not everyone gets to be a millionaire; credit-card 911 isn't unusual
What do you actually want to do?
Want to narrow it down a little?
That aside:
o the first City job is the hardest to get; seriously try for the graduate schemes
o you can change roles, but it isn't simple; an unrelated job is 'no experience'
o not everyone gets to be a millionaire; credit-card 911 isn't unusual
What do you actually want to do?
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